Donald Trump may not give a damn about Russia's attack on our democracy, but he's obsessed with the Russia probe and the leakers who have fueled it. Accordingly, national security officials are now seeing signs that the Trump administration is trying to narrow access to sensitive information to so few people that they can pinpoint who's doing the leaking when stories appear. Politico writes:
A half dozen officials across the national security community described to POLITICO a series of subtle and no-so-subtle changes that have led to an increasingly tense and paranoid working environment rooted in the White House’s obsession with leaks. [...]
The reverberations have spread in the weeks since, and several national security officials outside the White House have spoken of a strategic thinning of the ranks — limiting the number of people even read into certain sensitive matters, so that if something leaks, the suspects are obvious.
“The circles on this are so small,” one U.S. intelligence official said of the various Russia investigations that have cast a shadow on Trump’s White House.
One official said that confirming news about Russia was "almost impossible." Other officials also worried that the administration might be tracking the personal communications of federal employees, such as emails.
Naturally, Jeff "I don't recall" Sessions, who’s shown an inclination toward not sharing information even when he's required to do so, is serving as Trump's hammer.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has apparently heeded Trump’s guidance, launching multiple investigations and delivering a public scolding during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on June 13 to “persons in our intelligence agencies.”
“I fear that some people may find that they wish they hadn't leaked,” Sessions ominously warned.
Not all leaks are created equal and Trump has a particular aversion to ones that defy the White House narrative on Russia. But that doesn't make them illegal necessarily, says Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists’ Project on Government Secrecy.
“There is an established procedure for initiating leak investigations. And it includes a finding by an agency that not only is the leak accurate, but that it also damaged national security in a way that can be articulated,” Aftergood said. “There are many leaks that simply do not meet that standard.”
But the fear among some officials is that the standard practice for handling leak investigations and prosecutions could be reset under Trump.