The revelation that former President Trump had some of the nation’s most closely guarded forms of intelligence at his Florida home is renewing questions over the potentially grave risks to U.S. national security.

The affidavit used to secure a search warrant for Trump’s home released Friday reveals why the government was so alarmed: Among an initial batch of 184 classified documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January were secrets gained from “clandestine human sources,” information prohibited from being shared with foreign governments and information obtained by monitoring “foreign communications signals.”

Finding 25 sets of highly classified materials was enough to spur the Justice Department — after months of failed negotiations and a subpoena to Trump — to seek a search warrant, securing another 11 sets of documents that included more highly sensitive materials.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) alerted lawmakers over the weekend that it would begin work on a damage assessment to evaluate the fallout from what the Justice Department in June told Trump’s legal team were documents not “handled in an appropriate manner or stored in an appropriate location.” 

Former intelligence officials describe a painstaking process that will involve officials evaluating whether the classified documents were compromised and by whom in order to take steps to prevent further damage.

“They will proceed from the worst-case assumption: that any/all of the classified material could have been exposed to a sophisticated adversary intelligence service, and look at the documents from the standpoint of what can be gleaned about what the US knows (or doesn’t know) about a given topic,” James Clapper, who served as director of national intelligence under the Obama administration, wrote in an email to The Hill.

Clapper also said the intelligence community will need to examine the “chain of custody” of the documents, which will involve evaluating how they were handled since they were in the White House and by whom as well as who had access to the documents and whether they were photographed or copied.

The federal government has strict rules governing classified information, and the Justice Department has prosecuted individuals for unauthorized disclosures of the nation’s secrets. 

A search warrant unsealed earlier this month suggested that the Mar-a-Lago search is linked to an investigation of possible violations of the Espionage Act, in addition to other laws. 

In an interview, former Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, who served under Trump, recalled instructions he received when he entered government about not being able to publicly release classified documents without proper certification and the prohibition against moving classified information outside government buildings or taking it with you when you leave service.

“You don’t want to breach that requirement,” he said. “It can be dangerous if some of that is not handled the way it’s supposed to be handled.”

“Everybody knows that coming in. I’m sure the president was reminded of that by his legal team,” Coats said.

There is little known about the documents themselves, but experts say the classification markings disclosed in the unsealed documents suggest the information could present a severe danger were it to fall into the wrong hands. 

“That tells me that, by legal definition of top secret, somebody in a position of authority and knowledge classified that material because they thought its disclosure of such information could reasonably be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security — that is the definition in the Executive Order of Top Secret material,” said Steven Cash, a lawyer at Day Pitney specializing in national security who served at the CIA.

A letter from Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines to the chairs of the House’s Oversight and Reform Committee and Intelligence Committee indicates the agency that oversees the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies will begin a “classification review” of the documents, including an “assessment of the potential risk to national security that would result from the disclosure of the relevant documents.”

It’s a remarkable effort made all the more extraordinary by the unusual circumstances. 

Such assessments usually follow the known leak of information. But in this case, it’s not clear who may have accessed the documents.

Mar-a-Lago may have an exclusive membership list, but it’s hardly the restricted area the intelligence community seeks for cordoning off classified materials, with members of the public on-site to play golf.

Reporting from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette recently noted a woman under FBI investigation after posing as a wealthy socialite was spotted on the grounds at Mar-a-Lago, taking a photo with Trump and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on the course. 

The Justice Department subpoenaed security footage from Mar-a-Lago in June. But the footage goes back only about 60 days, according to reporting from The New York Times, and it’s not apparent how extensive the footage is and whether it includes video of the room or rooms where the documents were stored.

Experts warn the intelligence community may not be able to perform a full-fledged damage assessment, which usually requires producing a report detailing what information leaked, steps to mitigate the damage, and how to stop something similar from happening again.

“The utility of conducting a damage assessment here is overstated for two reasons. One is they’re not going to have good clarity on who accessed the documents, which is critical to assessing damage. And then, two, most assessments look at ‘lessons learned’: How did this happen? And how can we prevent it from happening again? There’s no good answer to that question here. You can’t just say we won’t share sensitive intelligence with the president in the future if he’s someone like Trump. That’s not viable in our system of government,” said Brian Greer, a former CIA attorney.

But even if ODNI undertakes a less formal review, it still has questions to answer, mainly in an effort to protect numerous sources of information — including informants — that are now likely at risk. 

“Separate from a formal damage assessment, the IC [intelligence community] will also consider near-term risk mitigation measures. Do they need to undertake some sort of immediate damage control effort? For instance, if there was information in the documents that could identify a human source, do we need to pull the source? Do we need to exfiltrate them? Or do we just need to at least give them a warning so they can stand down on meeting with their handlers for a little while? Do we need to go cover our tracks?” Greer said. 

“And then the same thing with a surveillance platform. Do we need to consider taking it down so that an adversary can’t discover it?” he added.

The intelligence community has had access to some of the tranche of documents stored at Trump’s home since May. 

But the recovery earlier this month adds another batch of documents to the 184 already shared by the Justice Department. 

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Greer warns, however, that the damage is already done.

“They’re going to err on the side of caution. In the absence of concrete information about who accessed the documents, they’re going to have no choice but to assume a compromise and take proactive measures to protect our sources and collection capabilities,” he said.

“That step alone will harm national security,” he added.  

He’ll return again to that crucial battleground state, this time in Pittsburgh, on Monday, to highlight workers on Labor Day. Then Biden will carry that message to another swing state, Wisconsin, where he will visit Milwaukee.

Biden and his fellow Democrats are more hopeful about their ability to hold the party’s slim congressional majorities this November after a string of recent legislative successes and the renewed attention on abortion rights following the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade.

Analysts said they still have an uphill fight, particularly in the House, given the history of a president’s party almost always losing seats in his first midterm election. But Democrats have been buoyed by strong performances in out-of-cycle House elections and new accomplishments to tout on the campaign trail, coinciding with a rise in Biden’s still-low approval rating.

Biden’s upcoming travel was designed to “speak directly to the American people on how congressional Democrats and this president delivered,” Jean-Pierre said Monday.

Biden traveled to Massachusetts last month to talk about climate change at a shuttered coal-fired power plant in Somerset. He tested positive for COVID-19 after that trip, derailing some additional travel plans and causing some concern about the Massachusetts officials who accompanied him, none of whom later reported testing positive.

The Boston visit on Sept. 12 will highlight the wide-ranging investments being made by the $1.2 trillion infrastructure law, one of Biden’s major legislative accomplishments. After Biden signed the law last November, his first stop in celebrating it was in Woodstock, N.H.

During his Wilkes-Barre visit Tuesday, Biden forcefully defended the FBI as the agency and its employees have come under withering criticism and threats of violence since executing a search warrant at former president Trump’s Florida residence earlier.

“It’s sickening to see the new attacks on the FBI, threatening the life of law enforcement and their families, for simply carrying out the law and doing their job,” Biden said before a crowd of more than 500 at Wilkes University. “I’m opposed to defunding the police; I’m also opposed to defunding the FBI.”

Biden also used his remarks to promote his administration’s crime-prevention efforts and to continue to pressure Congress to revive a long-expired federal ban on assault-style weapons. Democrats and Republicans worked together in a rare effort to pass gun safety legislation earlier this year after massacres in Buffalo and Uvalde, Texas. They were the first significant firearm restrictions approved by Congress in nearly three decades, but Biden has repeatedly said more needs to be done.

“We beat the NRA. We took them on and beat the NRA straight up. You have no idea how intimidating they are to elected officials,” an animated Biden said. “We’re not stopping here. I’m determined to ban assault weapons in this country! Determined. I did it once before. And I’ll do it again.”

As a senator, Biden played a leading role in temporarily banning some assault-style weapons, including firearms similar to the AR-15 that have exploded in popularity in recent years, and he wants to put the law back into place. Biden argued that there was no rationale for such weapons “outside of a war zone” and noted that parents of the young victims at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde had to supply DNA because the weapon used in the massacre rendered the bodies unidentifiable.

“DNA, to say that’s my baby!” Biden said. “What the hell is the matter with us?”

GLOBE STAFF AND ASSOCIATED PRESS

Trump adds high-profile lawyer to team

Former president Donald Trump has hired a high-profile lawyer to help him with the aftermath of the FBI search of his club and home in Florida and the criminal investigation into his handling of sensitive government documents.

The lawyer, Christopher Kise, is a former solicitor general for the state of Florida who has argued cases before the Supreme Court and worked as a transition adviser for Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, a Republican. Kise, who is now in private practice, formally joined the team in recent days, according to two of Trump’s associates. His hiring was earlier reported by NBC News.

Kise is joining a team that a number of other high-profile lawyers have steered clear of, concerned about Trump’s history of nonpayment or his insistence on trying to run his own legal efforts.

Kise will join two lawyers who are not licensed in Florida — James Trusty and M. Evan Corcoran — on the case, which is related to the handling of hundreds of pages of government documents, many marked as highly classified. Trump had been keeping the documents at his members-only club and home in Florida, Mar-a-Lago, since he left the White House on Jan. 20, 2021, at the end of his term.

Kise is expected to be part of the team appearing in federal court in Florida on Thursday before Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee. Cannon has signaled her intention to allow the appointment of a special master Trump is seeking to review whether any of the material taken by the federal agents is covered under executive privilege.

The request has raised questions, as Trump is no longer the sitting president and executive privilege covers the office of the presidency.

NEW YORK TIMES

Secret Service official tied to Jan. 6 investigation retires

Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service official at the center of the House investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the Capitol, has retired.

‘’We can confirm that Anthony Ornato retired from the U.S. Secret Service today in good standing after 25 years of devoted service,’’ said Secret Service Special Agent Kevin Helgert in a statement late Monday. Politico first reported on the retirement.

Ornato, as head of President Trump’s personal security detail, grew close to the then-president, who hired him as White House deputy chief of staff for operations — a highly unprecedented transition in the agency’s history. In that role, Ornato helped coordinate a controversial June 2020 photo opportunity in which Trump strode defiantly across Lafayette Square to pose with a Bible after the park was forcibly cleared of peaceful protesters.

But the spotlight focused on Ornato after Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, testified before the House committee investigating the Capitol attack that Ornato told her Trump lunged at a Secret Service agent who refused to take him to the Capitol after a rally at the Ellipse, before the riot.

Hutchinson said Ornato told her Trump was ‘’irate’’ that he wasn’t allowed to go to the Capitol with his supporters after his speech. Ornato, she testified, said Trump lunged toward the then-head of his Secret Service detail, Bobby Engel. Engel, Hutchinson said, never disputed what Ornato had said.

But Ornato immediately disputed Hutchinson’s testimony and said he’d be willing to testify before the Jan. 6 panel to refute her statements. While the committee interviewed Ornato before Hutchinson’s testimony, it is not clear whether he has spoken to them again since.

WASHINGTON POST

By David T. Burbach

The 1991 Persian Gulf War is often called “the first space war” owing to the American military’s use of global positioning systems and other space-based technologies—the first of several US conflicts against opponents with no space capabilities. Three decades later, the Russia–Ukraine war is perhaps the first two-sided space war.

As a potential harbinger of the future, Russia’s war in Ukraine offers four preliminary lessons for political and military leaders. First, despite having no indigenous space capability, Ukraine has made effective battlefield use of space-based communications and intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR) assets from US and European commercial providers. Second, for all the attention on kinetic anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons, Russian counterspace attacks have been limited to the cyber domain—achieving some success and causing collateral damage in NATO countries. Third, commercial space will only grow in importance in conflicts, while policy makers in Western countries have yet to make clear when and how they would protect commercial assets. Last, Russia is gaining surprisingly little advantage from its space capabilities, reflecting the long-term weaknesses of the Russian space industry—weaknesses not shared by China, however.

Combatants can conduct space-enabled operations without owning space assets

In 2022, Ukraine had no national space capability. Nevertheless, space systems, in the form of third-party commercial and government assets, have played an important role in the Ukrainian war effort. The Ukrainian military makes extensive use of commercial satellite communications, in particular satellite links share data for its networked artillery system (GIS Arta, sometimes called “Uber for Artillery,” is an android app that collects target information from drones, US and NATO intelligence feeds, and conventional forward observers, then distributes orders to fire among multiple artillery units to make counterbattery fire more difficult.). Ukraine obtains high-resolution imagery from Western commercial firms, including synthetic-aperture radar that can “see” at night and through clouds. Specifics on Ukraine’s military use of commercial images are scarce, but the available resolution and timeliness of such images should make them tactically valuable. Commercial imagery can show individual military vehicles, and constellations of multiple satellites can image any target every few hours. This capability provides enough information to enable warfighters to attack fixed targets, or to cue assets such as unmanned aerial vehicles to the vicinity of mobile targets. The United States is also reportedly sharing imagery or signals intelligence from classified collection satellites.

The war in Ukraine demonstrates that what matters is having access to the products of space systems, not owning the satellites. With the explosion in commercial communications and imaging services, many combatants will have such products. Access will not be universal, however. Western companies are far in the lead in their capabilities and are subject to formal and informal limits on the customers to whom they sell data. Iran or North Korea could not buy the level of space-based services that Ukraine has at any price. Western governments should see this as a comparative advantage in supporting partners relative to what Russia or China can provide to their clients. Facilitating commercial access, supplying funding, and offering training in the use of commercial space products (or sharing classified products) can affect battlefield performance in a tangible way; moreover, such efforts are relatively low cost and perhaps less visibly provocative than weapons shipments.

Counterspace operations are more likely to be cyber or electronic than kinetic

In November 2021, Russia tested its Nudol kinetic ASAT weapon and created a cloud of orbital debris that threatened astronauts and satellites of many nations. Whether or not that demonstration was meant as a warning to NATO regarding Ukraine, there are no reports of physical space attacks being attempted. Russian cyberattacks, however, have succeeded. On the first day of the conflict, a Russian operation used destructive malware to disable tens of thousands of user terminals of ViaSat, a US-based commercial network, requiring factory repair of the devices before they could function again. The Ukrainian military was a heavy ViaSat user and the obvious target. Following that attack, SpaceX collaborated with Ukraine to deploy Starlink terminals. SpaceX leaders report that Russia has also attacked their service, so far unsuccessfully.

Space experts had assessed that cyber and electronic jamming would be more likely than physical space attacks, for several reasons. Cyberattacks do not create debris, they are less expensive than building interceptor missiles, offer deniability, and are probably less likely to spur armed retaliation. Developments in Ukraine also demonstrate the value of redundancy against ASAT attacks, that is, relying on large numbers of individually expendable satellites instead of a handful of large satellites. Starlink has twenty-five hundred satellites in service—too many for Russia to shoot down with its few, expensive interceptors. Communications and remote sensing services will continue to shift toward these so-called “mega-constellations.” The success of Russia’s attack on ViaSat, however, shows that an invulnerable satellite fleet is irrelevant if cyberattacks can impair its ground-based control systems and user access.

Commercial firms as important actors—and targets?

The Russia-Ukraine war highlights the explosive growth of the commercial space sector. Although the US military has long leased bandwidth on commercial satellites, the integration of Starlink at the battlefield level and the tactical use of commercial remote sensing is groundbreaking. Unsurprisingly, Russia says the satellites of companies working directly with the Ukrainian military are legitimate military targets—and the Russians are probably correct under international law. The international community accepts the established principle that third parties directly and knowingly contributing to a combatant’s war effort can be attacked, within the limits of proportionality and when causing minimal collateral damage. Recent articles in Chinese military newspapers suggested the Chinese also believe Starlink could be valid target in a future conflict.

It is unclear how the United States and its allies would respond to attacks on commercial space systems, whether by physical or cyber means. Russia’s successful ViaSat attack caused significant property damage to civilians in NATO nations, requiring tens of thousands of terminals to be replaced and causing disruptions, such as knocking thousands of wind turbines off the European electric grid for days. Satellite operators have been asking governments for more assistance in securing their systems and for more clarity about what governments will do to protect them; the current lack of clarity risks causing miscalculation by adversaries.

Evaluating Russian space capabilities (and lessons about China?)

Despite the long history of Soviet and Russian spaceflight, it is not obvious that the Russian military has benefited more from space than the Ukrainian side. Russian command-and-control difficulties, the absence of an apparent ISR advantage, and surprisingly large errors from Russian precision munitions (presumably GLONASS-guided), all hint at less effective employment of space systems than that of the United States or its more capable allies. This is not entirely surprising, however. Russian military communications and surveillance satellites lag far behind those of the United States in numbers and technology–Russia may only have two operational military imaging satellites. Technology sanctions imposed in 2014 set back the development of Russian space capabilities. Some Russian munitions may have been built with chips pulled from consumer appliances, but there is no alternative source for the unique radiation-hardened chips needed in satellites. Strict technology sanctions and the likely decline in Russian government revenues make it doubtful that Russia can close the space gap.

In the future, China would most likely be a more adept military space power than Russia. Beijing has launched dozens of military ISR satellites in the last five years. China has an emerging commercial space sector, and, unlike Russia, it has a sophisticated domestic electronics industry that can supply components for advanced military satellites. Russia might still lead China in ASAT missiles and a few other areas, but in most respects Chinese military space capabilities have surpassed those of Russia in quantity and technology. How the Chinese military fares at exploiting and integrating space capabilities in a real conflict remains to be seen.

Policy recommendations

Several implications flow from these observations:

1. Space-based information services are a key enabler that the United States and its allies can provide to partner nations, especially “middle powers” with some technical proficiency (as opposed to less developed militaries, as in Afghanistan or Iraq).
2. Redundant mega-constellations offset adversaries’ kinetic ASAT weapons, but cybersecurity at all levels must be a critical design and operational focus of space systems.
3. The US commercial space sector is a strategic asset, but the United States and its allies need to develop clear policies for protecting commercial systems, whether through defense or deterrence.
4. Although China has long been seen as “behind” Russia in space, that view is outdated. US military planners should assume China will likely make more effective use of space capabilities in a future conflict than Russia has in Ukraine.

***

David T. Burbach is an Associate Professor of National Security Affairs, US Naval War College. The ideas expressed in this essay are the author’s personal views and do not represent those of the Naval War College or the US government.

Image: A Starlink antenna operates during the Global Information Dominance Experiment 3 and Architecture Demonstration and Evaluation 5 at Alpena Combat Readiness Training Center, Alpena, Michigan, July 9, 2021. The North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command, NORAD and USNORTHCOM, in partnership with all 11 Combatant Commands, led the third in a series of Global Information Dominance Experiments designed to rapidly develop the capabilities required to increase deterrence options in competition and crisis through a data-centric software-based approach. GIDE events combine people and technology to innovate and accelerate system development for domain awareness, information dominance, decisional superiority, and global integration. The GIDE 3 experiment was executed in conjunction with the Department of the Air Force’s Chief Architect Office (DAF CAO) as part of their fifth Architecture Demonstration and Evaluation event (ADE 5), and the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center. (US Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Peter Thompson)