In 1952, President Harry Truman started giving intelligence briefings to presidential candidates before the election to aid in the transition between presidents. Amid reports intelligence agencies plan to give Trump briefings despite his trial with classified documents, Rep. Adam Schiff expressed to “Meet the Press” host Kristen Welker that he hopes the intelligence community will simplify the briefing for Donald Trump.
“That means providing him with only necessary information that won’t expose sources or methods, as we cannot trust him to handle the information correctly,” added Schiff.
“He’s been so careless. So yes, it does worry me. It’s part of a long tradition, they will be cautious about what they share with him — and they should,” the representative noted.
Schiff was previously chair of the House Intelligence Committee when the Democrats controlled the chamber.
Regarding the briefings, Schiff also mentioned that it is customary for nominees to receive them, “but we’ve never had a situation where one of the candidates for president has been so criminally negligent when it comes to handling — if not worse — when it comes to handling classified information.”
In June 2023, Trump was arrested and charged with 37 counts related to the mishandling of more than 100 classified documents containing secrets that pertained to national security. He pled not guilty to the Espionage Act charges.
Schiff also talked with Welker about Rep. Katie Porter’s claims that the California Senate race was “rigged.” Schiff easily defeated fellow Democrats Porter and Rep. Barbara Lee in California’s open primary to fill Dianne Feinstein’s seat in the U.S. Senate. Despite the use of the term, Schiff praised Porter for running “a tough campaign” and noted he has plenty of “respect for my colleagues.”
However, “that term ‘rigged’ is a very loaded term in the year of Trump,” Schiff added. “It connotes fraud or ballot stuffing, false claims like those of Donald Trump. And I think what’s remarkable is Democrats very quickly rallied to say, ‘No, we don’t use that language. The election was legitimate.'”
“And this was a sharp contrast to how the Republican Party treats allegations of rigged elections, which is they’ve gone along with them,” Schiff said. “Indeed, they’re urging President Trump to pardon the Jan. 6 insurrectionists if he ever got a chance. So a very different reaction among the parties to any kind of challenge to our democracy.”
Watch the interview with Rep. Adam Schiff in the video above.
