How Trump’s Attacks on U.S. Intelligence Will Come Back to Haunt Him

January 11, 2017  |  POLITICO

Dickey Center Director Daniel Benjamin has published a piece for POLITICO, "How Trump’s Attacks on U.S. Intelligence Will Come Back to Haunt Him." 

This kind of trash talking diminishes public respect for the intelligence community, which relies on government officials to defend its reputation because so much of its work is never heard of outside the Executive Branch. This might work for Trump in the short run, as he scrambles to defend the legitimacy of the 2016 election. Eventually, it will backfire. At some point during his presidency, Trump is going to want to act on intelligence he receives. And what will happen when he tries to justify to the nation that he is deploying troops or firing missiles on the basis of information brought to him by agencies he has so thoroughly denigrated? Trump seems not to understand that governing is a team sport, and that his credibility will ultimately depend on those who serve the administration.

Read the entire article in POLITICO.