White House drafts docs for Trump to revoke more security clearances: report

The White House has drafted more documents to revoke the security clearances of current and former officials who have been critical of President Trump, The Washington Post reported Friday.

Trump is reportedly prepared to sign “most, if not all” of the directives, a senior White House official told The Post.

The official also told the newspaper that White House communications staffers, including press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, are discussing when it is best to release the announcements as a way to pull attention from negative media reports.

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Trump earlier this week revoked the security clearance of former CIA Director John Brennan, a frequent and vocal critic of the president.

The White House denied that the move was in retaliation for Brennan’s criticism. He and others have disputed that claim, and the revocation has drawn the ire of current and former intelligence officials.

The announcement on Brennan’s security clearance came as the White House faced a barrage of negative media reports this week surrounding former aide Omarosa Manigault Newman’s new tell-all book about her time in the administration.

Trump said earlier Friday that he is ready to revoke the security clearance of Justice Department official Bruce Ohr.

“I think Bruce Ohr is a disgrace. I suspect I’ll be taking it away very quickly,” the president told reporters outside the White House. “For him to be in the Justice Department and doing what he did, that is a disgrace.”

Ohr’s wife, Nellie, worked for the political consulting firm Fusion GPS. The firm hired Christopher Steele, the former British spy whose controversial dossier alleged ties between Trump and the Kremlin.

Ohr worked in the deputy attorney general’s office until late last year. He was demoted after he was found to have had contact with Steele.

The White House earlier this week said that it was considering pulling security clearances for a number of former officials, including former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former FBI Director James Comey, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, former National Security Agency (NSA) Director Michael Hayden and former FBI staffers Lisa Page and Peter Strzok.

Several of the former officials have said that they already no longer have security clearances.