Editor’s Note: Samantha Vinograd is a CNN national security analyst. She served on President Obama’s National Security Council from 2009-2013 and at the Treasury Department under President George W. Bush. Follow her @sam_vinograd. The views expressed in this commentary are her own. View more opinion articles on CNN.
By putting a “for sale” sign on his forehead – and indicating that he’s open for business when it comes to receiving dirt on his political rivals – President Donald Trump is encouraging foreign governments to attack his political opponents.
We know that Russia used various tools to attack Hillary Clinton - and then laundered that stolen information through organizations including WikiLeaks as part of an information warfare campaign. No one, especially the President, who has access to the most sensitive intelligence in the world, can claim ignorance about how Russia attacked Clinton.
Rather than learning from what happened, Trump is encouraging Russia and potentially others to do more of the same. This opens up every candidate - and perceived Trump rival - to attacks from hostile foreign powers.
President Trump’s latest comments, during an ABC News interview, indicating that he would consider accepting negative material on political opponents from foreign governments, and that he wouldn’t necessarily report the contact to the FBI, are just the latest in a long line of counterintelligence red flags. Trump said, “There isn’t anything wrong with listening.”
It is unclear whether the FBI has an ongoing counterintelligence investigation into President Trump. But if they don’t, they may want to revisit why not.
It is unclear how a foreign government would contact Trump without other US government officials knowing - presidential communications are supposed to be on official devices that preserve communications, and typically members of the White House team listen in on presidential calls or at least get transcripts.
His comments are a worrisome indication that he’s open to connecting with foreign governments without his own team knowing. That’s a violation of the Presidential Records Act, which requires that all White House communications be archived, and a major counterintelligence misstep because it means foreign governments could know more than our own does.
By indicating that he’s open to receiving help from foreign governments - despite troves of open source information indicating that