US Intelligence Says Trump Administration Politicized Intelligence On Foreign Election Influence,

US media is report­ing that US intel­li­gence has con­clud­ed that the Trump admin­is­tra­tion politi­cized the intel­li­gence around for­eign elec­tion inter­fer­ence in 2020, result­ing in sig­nif­i­cant errors in its reports last year to Con­gress and the pub­lic. Accord­ing to a New York Times report:

Jan­u­ary. 8, 2021 The Trump admin­is­tra­tion politi­cized the intel­li­gence around for­eign elec­tion inter­fer­ence in 2020, result­ing in sig­nif­i­cant errors in its reports last year to Con­gress and the pub­lic, a report by the intel­li­gence com­mu­ni­ty ombuds­man con­clud­ed. Bar­ry A. Zulauf, the ana­lyt­ic ombuds­man in the Office of the Direc­tor of Nation­al Intel­li­gence, found there was “a loss of objec­tiv­i­ty” and politi­ciza­tion of intel­li­gence in the elec­tion threat report­ing last year. “Analy­sis on for­eign elec­tion inter­fer­ence was delayed, dis­tort­ed or obstruct­ed out of con­cern over pol­i­cy­mak­er reac­tions or for polit­i­cal rea­sons,” said the report, which was sub­mit­ted to Con­gress on Thurs­day. The for­mal val­i­da­tion dove­tails with wide­spread per­cep­tions about the Trump administration’s han­dling of intel­li­gence and under­scores the chal­lenge await­ing the Biden admin­is­tra­tion as it pre­pares to take over the nation’s spy agen­cies. The report will be sent to the Sen­ate Intel­li­gence Com­mit­tee. Still, because it was com­plet­ed under an intel­li­gence direc­tor viewed skep­ti­cal­ly by Democ­rats, it is unlike­ly to be seen as the final word on what happened.

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In Octo­ber 2020, the GIOR not­ed that the US Depart­ment of Home­land Secu­ri­ty (DHS) Octo­ber 2020 “Home­land Threat Assess­ment” failed to men­tion Chi­nese efforts regard­ing the upcom­ing US elec­tions, instead focus­ing on the Chi­nese oper­a­tions cen­tered on the COVID-19 pandemic.