Despite Concerns About Blackmail, Flynn Heard C.I.A. Secrets

The following article by Matt Apuzzo, Matthew Rosenberg and Adam Goldman was posted on the New York Times website June 20, 2017:

Mike Pompeo, center, the C.I.A. director, at the Capitol to brief members of the House Intelligence Committee last month. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times

WASHINGTON — Senior officials across the government became convinced in January that the incoming national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, had become vulnerable to Russian blackmail.

At the F.B.I., the C.I.A., the Justice Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence — agencies responsible for keeping American secrets safe from foreign spies — career officials agreed that Mr. Flynn represented an urgent problem.

Yet nearly every day for three weeks, the new C.I.A. director, Mike Pompeo, sat in the Oval Office and briefed President Trump on the nation’s most sensitive intelligence — with Mr. Flynn listening. Mr. Pompeo has not said whether C.I.A. officials left him in the dark about their views of Mr. Flynn, but one administration official said Mr. Pompeo did not share any concerns about Mr. Flynn with the president. Continue reading “Despite Concerns About Blackmail, Flynn Heard C.I.A. Secrets”