John Ratcliffe

On the menu today: The highest levels of the administration display a jaw-dropping casual disregard for laws regarding the handling of classified information; officials refuse to hold themselves to the standard they held their predecessors, and their response indicates a deep-rooted culture of irresponsibility, excuse-making, and blame-shifting.

The frightening thing is, I could have written that sentence about the past three or four administrations.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe confirmed Wednesday the US stopped sharing intelligence with Ukraine after President Trump paused military aid to Kyiv amid its three-year war with Russia.

Trump prevented further military aid from flowing to Ukraine on Monday after his public feud with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office over a joint economic investment with Kyiv on rare-earth minerals.

The U.S. has banned its allies, including the U.K., from passing on American intelligence, according to new reports, a move set to cut off Ukraine's access to vital information used to coordinate strikes and protect its cities.

The Trump administration appears to have ordered at least a partial halt to the crucial intelligence that the United States shares with Ukraine to defend against the Russian invasion, according to a US military official and public remarks made by top Trump administration officials.

The CIA now believes the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic most likely originated from a laboratory, according to an assessment that points the finger at China even while acknowledging that the spy agency has “low confidence” in its own conclusion.

The CIA now believes the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic most likely originated from a laboratory, according to an assessment released on Saturday. It points the finger at China despite acknowledging that the spy agency has “low confidence” in its own conclusion.

Having been temporarily banned from Twitter, Facebook, and Google over 'COVID conspiracy theories' (when we first suggested in January 2020 that the fact there was a Level 4 virus lab in Wuhan was likely not a coincidence to the origin of COVID), and being accused by intel officials of being a propaganda spreading site, we couldn't help but see the irony (and not rage, frustration, or desire for retribution), when the CIA itself confirmed this week that it found a lab origin “more likely” for the COVID-19 pandemic, joining two other top U.S.

Inside the US intelligence community, a deep wariness about a second Trump administration has set in, stoked by memories of the antagonistic relationship the nation’s spy agencies had with Donald Trump the last time he was president.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said on Tuesday he had picked John Ratcliffe, a close ally who was director of national intelligence at the end of his first term, to serve as director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Ratcliffe served as the nation's top spy from late May 2020 until Trump left office in January 2021. More recently, he was co-chair of the Center for American Security, a think tank advocating Trump positions, and advised the former Republican president on national security policy during his 2024 campaign.