Former President Donald Trump put U.S. national security at greater risk than anyone realized, argued former FBI agent Peter Strzok on Monday's edition of MSNBC's "Deadline: White House."
This comes amid new reports about the extent of classified information Trump discussed to Australian billionaire Anthony Pratt.
"A president who is compromised by, to be totally blunt, his business failures, his desperate need for money, and his complete lack of regard for U.S. national security," said anchor Nicolle Wallace. "What do you make of this new reporting?"
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"Nicolle, I think as you look at what [special counsel] Jack Smith appears to be pursuing, he's exploring all the different ways and reasons that Donald Trump may have kept classified information," said Strzok, who previously worked on the FBI's Russia investigation and was a constant target of ire by Trump and then by the right. He's now in a lawsuit against Trump.
"Now, the interesting thing is those are exactly the ways that a hostile foreign intelligence service would seek to elicit classified information from him," Strzok continued. "So, whether he's, you know, trying to, you know, denigrate Mark Milley by presenting classified information about an Iran war plan, whether he's trying to get additional donations from an Australian cardboard box manufacturer, whether he's posing with selfies with any number of scantily clad women around Mar-a-Lago, it is clear that one of the ways he is using this classified information that he kept or used that information is to, you know, make somebody look bad, is to impress somebody."
"But guess what," continued Strzok. "Every intelligence service in the world, including the CIA here at home, but overseas in Russia and China, are well aware of using these exact motivations to extract classified information, to extract national defense information from people. That is their job. That's their profession. And they have millions and millions of dollars to do it. And so what we're seeing is evidence that, when it comes to Trump, these techniques work."
He went on to say he isn't as concerned about what Trump told Pratt, and more about who else Trump is bragging to and ultimately giving national secrets to.
"It concerns me hugely and is just devastating if he's talking about the capabilities of our nuclear submarines," Strzok added. "If he is doing that to a — or sharing that with an Australian businessman — who's willing to describe that to Jack Smith, what on earth has he told somebody who's acting as an agent of the government of Russia? Of the government of China? Somebody who has gotten close to him and gotten the same sort of information. It is absolutely devastating from the perspective of what Trump was not doing to protect our national security. And I think we're seeing Jack Smith just articulate and explore all the different reasons why Trump kept this information."
Watch the video below or at the link here.
Peter Strzok fears what else Trump leaked from national secrets: "we may never know"www.youtube.com
