Trump is 'drunk on power'
Former CIA Director John Brennan criticised President Donald Trump on Friday for revoking his security clearance and said the president is "drunk on power."
"The fact that he's using a security clearance of a former CIA director as a pawn in his public relations strategy I think is just so reflective of somebody who, quite frankly, I don't want to use this term maybe, but he's drunk on power. He really is, and I think he's abusing the powers of that office," Brennan told MSNBC's Rachel Maddow during an interview.
Trump announced on Wednesday that he was stripping Brennan, who has been an outspoken critic of the president, of his security clearance and accused the former CIA director of "lying" and giving "increasingly frenzied commentary" on television.
Brennan was reacting to a report in The Washington Post on Friday that said the decision to revoke his security clearance had been finalised in order to switch the news cycle's focus from former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman's new book.
The book contains critical passages about Trump, and Manigault Newman has been releasing audiotapes she surreptitiously recorded of Trump, White House chief of staff John Kelly and other top aides to the president.
Meanwhile, former CIA directors and another half dozen of America's most senior spies have issued an unprecedented condemnation of Trump, after his decision to blacklist their colleague John Brennan.
In a statement, ex-CIA bosses appointed by Republican and Democratic presidents -- including Robert Gates, George Tenet, Porter Goss, Leon Panetta and David Petraeus -- denounced Trump's decision to strip Brennan of his security clearance.
Dozens of other former spies signaled their support for the statement.
"The president's action regarding John Brennan and the threats of similar action against other former officials has nothing to do with who should and should not hold security clearances -- and everything to do with an attempt to stifle free speech," the statement read.
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