Day 386: Report: Trump Refuses to Read Intel Briefings
When Donald Trump riffs off-the-cuff, he often seems to have very little understanding of the details he discusses. Most of the time, he speaks in broad generalities: ‘We’re going to defeat ISIS!’ or ‘Our military is stronger than ever before!’
The Washington Post’s recent report shed some light as to the reason why: he refuses to read the most vital daily intelligence.
For much of the past year, President Trump has declined to participate in a practice followed by the past seven of his predecessors: He rarely if ever reads the President’s Daily Brief, a document that lays out the most pressing information collected by U.S. intelligence agencies from hot spots around the world.
Trump prefers a shorter, oral briefing of select issues — and receives them only two to three times per week — compared to the comprehensive analysis of the written document provided to him daily.
Reading the traditionally dense intelligence book is not Trump’s preferred “style of learning,” according to a person with knowledge of the situation.
The White House has been trying to tailor the briefings — which come from career analysts, primarily at the CIA — to Trump’s apparently preschool-style learning: by augmenting big and scary words with photos, videos and graphics.
Trump’s decision to forgo reading the daily briefing means that while he’s understanding the general picture, he’s not actually getting the nuance. If someone was to skim a lengthy book, would they understand the depth of characters, or the overall themes, or the importance of specific details? Highly unlikely.
The same is true, with far worse potential consequences, for the president’s daily briefings.
Several intelligence experts said that the president’s aversion to diving deeper into written intelligence details — the “homework” that past presidents have done to familiarize themselves with foreign policy and national security — makes both him and the country more vulnerable.
Leon Panetta, a former CIA director and defense secretary for President Barack Obama, said Trump could miss important context and nuance if he is relying solely on an oral briefing. The arrangement also increases pressure on the president’s national security team, which cannot entirely replace a well-informed commander in chief, he said.
“Something will be missed,” Panetta said. “If for some reason his instincts on what should be done are not backed up by the intelligence because he hasn’t taken the time to read that intel, it increases the risk that he will make a mistake.”
A former CIA assistant director, Mark Lowenthal, agreed, and warned that shorter briefings leave Trump hindered in making decisions.
“You need to get immersed in a story over its entire course. You can’t just jump into an issue and come up to speed on the actors and the implications. The odds are pretty good that something will arise later on for which he has no intelligence basis for helping him work through it.”
Trump, a businessman, has never had to deal with national security issues before. In 70 years, he’s never received daily briefings of information outside his bailiwick. If anyone should endeavor to get caught up and be as learned as possible about intelligence issues, it should be someone without that background and knowledge.
Instead, without fully grasping the subjects, the players or the context, Trump is choosing to make huge national security decisions without fully grasping all facets of the situation.
386 days in, 1076 to go
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