FIGHTIN’ WORDS

Former CIA Chief Morrell: Trump Isn’t a Patriot

“He cares more about himself than anything about this nation.”

The former deputy director of the CIA doesn't think Donald Trump is a patriot.

Michael Morrell spent 33 years working for the Central Intelligence Agency, much of it as analyst assessing the nature and character of foreign leaders. When he uses those same analytical skills on Trump, he told reporters Thursday, he seems a selfish, self-centered man.

“He cares more about himself than anything about this nation,” Morrell told reporters on a conference call organized by the Hillary Clinton campaign. The definition of a patriot is to put nation before self, the intelligence analyst said. “Donald Trump is not a patriot.”

Morrell spent more than three decades working as an intelligence analyst, advising both Democratic and Republican administrations. On multiple occasions, he served as the acting director of the CIA when the position was vacant. He is no liberal progressive: after leaving the CIA he defended the use of controversial “enhanced interrogation techniques” that many consider torture and was used during the Bush administration.

But in August, Morrell endorsed Hilary Clinton in The New York Times, writing that, “In the intelligence business, we would say that Mr. Putin had recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.”

—Tim Mak

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