WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump revoked the security clearances of 37 current and former national security officials, many of whom worked on Russia analysis or foreign threats to U.S. elections, according to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
Trump has stripped security clearances throughout his administration, including from his best-known rivals like former President Joe Biden. But the actions announced Tuesday were a deeper cut, pushing far into the national security establishment.
At least three current senior officials at various intelligence agencies, all with reputations for nonpartisan work, are among those who lost their clearances and their jobs.
They included Shelby Pierson, a senior intelligence official who warned Congress about Russian meddling in the 2020 election; a senior CIA analyst currently serving undercover; and Vinh X. Nguyen, a senior National Security Agency data scientist.
Rescinding security clearances appears to be part of a campaign by Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, to reveal what she sees as flaws in intelligence assessments about Russian malign influence operations during the 2016 election. Gabbard’s attention to that issue has won praise from Trump, who has long claimed without evidence that the Obama administration tried to undermine him in that vote.
Critics also say that Trump has turned the focus onto the 2016 election to distract from questions about disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.
“Gabbard’s move to yank clearances from a seemingly random list of national security officials is a reckless abuse of the security clearance process and nothing more than another sad attempt to distract from the administration’s failure to release the Epstein files,” said Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., who is vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Warner said he had introduced legislation to create standards for security clearances and prevent political abuse of the system.
Current and former officials said they were particularly distraught by the removal of Nguyen, a gifted mathematician, from the NSA.
Nguyen was mentioned in an article in Real Clear Investigations that noted his work for the director of national intelligence at the time of the 2016 election assessments. The article was highlighted on social media by Sebastian Gorka, a Trump administration national security official.
Nguyen is an expert on quantum computing, data science and cyber issues. He has been working on artificial intelligence projects for the agency. Former officials said the loss of his expertise could set back the U.S. government’s development of key technologies.
Gabbard is not the only administration official releasing documents or investigating the 2016 intelligence assessments. After she released a report and accused the Obama administration of a “treasonous conspiracy,” Attorney General Pam Bondi announced a task force to look into potential wrongdoing. John Ratcliffe, the CIA director, declassified a tradecraft review related to the 2016 inquiries and made a referral to the FBI seeking an investigation of John Brennan, the former CIA head.
Tuesday afternoon, Gabbard released a memo on social media about her actions, which she said were taken at the direction of Trump.
“Being entrusted with a security clearance is a privilege, not a right,” Gabbard wrote. “Those in the Intelligence Community who betray their oath to the Constitution and put their own interests ahead of the interests of the American people have broken the sacred trust they promised to uphold.”
© 2025 The New York Times Company