WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration's top intelligence officials stressed to Congress the threat they said was posed by international criminal gangs, drug cartels and human smuggling, testifying in a hearing Tuesday that unfolded against the backdrop of a security breach involving the mistaken leak of attack plans to a journalist.
The annual hearing on worldwide threats before the Senate Intelligence Committee offered a glimpse of the new administration’s reorienting of priorities. It comes when President Donald Trump has opened a new line of communication with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, and has focused national security attention closer to home to counter violent crime that officials link to cross-border drug trafficking.
“Criminal groups drive much of the unrest and lawlessness in the Western Hemisphere," said Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence. Atop a long list of national security challenges, she cited the need to combat cartels that she said were “engaging in a wide array of illicit activity, from narcotics trafficking to money laundering to smuggling of illegal immigrants and human trafficking.”
Different parties prioritized different issues
The hearing occurred as officials across multiple presidential administrations describe an increasingly complicated blizzard of threats.
In the committee room, it unfolded in split-screen fashion: Republican senators hewed to the pre-scheduled topic by drilling down on China and the fentanyl scourge, while Democrat after Democrat offered sharp criticism over a security breach they called reckless and dangerous.
“If this information had gotten out, American lives could have been lost,” Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the intelligence committee said of the exposed Signal messages. Added Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon: “I am of the view that there ought to be resignations.” “An embarrassment,” said Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado, who shouted down CIA Director John Ratcliffe as he demanded answers.
Gabbard and other officials did note the U.S. government's longstanding national security concerns, including international terrorism and the threat she said was posed by countries including Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.
China, for one, has heavily invested in stealth aircraft, hypersonic weapons and nuclear arms and is looking to outcompete the U.S. when it comes to artificial intelligence, while Russia remains a “formidable competitor” and still maintains a large nuclear arsenal.
“The direction for the FBI is to track down any individuals with any terrorist ties whatsoever, whether it be ISIS or another foreign terrorist organization,” said FBI Director Kash Patel. “And now to include the new designations of the cartels, down south and elsewhere."
But the elevation of international drug trafficking as a top-tier threat was a notable turnabout in focus. Over the past four years, the U.S. government has been more likely to place a premium on concerns over sophisticated Chinese espionage plots, ransomware attacks that have crippled hospitals and international and domestic terrorism plots.
The hearing unfolded in the midst of an eruption over text messaging
Tuesday's hearing took taking place one day after news broke that several top national security officials in the Republican administration, including Ratcliffe, Gabbard and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, texted attack plans for military strikes in Yemen to a group chat in a secure messaging app that included the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic.
The text chain “contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing,” journalist Jeffrey Goldberg reported. The strikes began two hours after Goldberg received the details.
“Horrified” by the leak of what is historically strictly guarded information, the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee, Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, said he will be demanding answers in a separate hearing Wednesday with his panel.
The two days of hearings also come against the backdrop of a starkly different approach toward Russia following years of Biden administration sanctions over its war against Ukraine.
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed during a lengthy call with President Donald Trump to an immediate pause in strikes against energy infrastructure in what the White House described as the first step in a “movement to peace.”
