The White House slammed President-elect Donald Trump Wednesday for comparing U.S. intelligence agencies to Nazi Germany, saying the comparison was “deeply misguided.”
“As President Obama has said many times, the men and women of our intelligence community are patriots,” said White House press secretary Josh Earnest.
He said it was misguided of anyone “at any level” to question the motives of U.S. intelligence operatives.
Mr. Trump questioned whether intelligence officials were responsible for the leak of an unverified document with damaging allegations about his activities in Russia, invoking Nazi Germany.
“I think it was disgraceful that the intelligence agencies allowed any information that turned out to be so false and fake” to get out, Mr. Trump said Wednesday. “That’s something that Nazi Germany would have done and did do.”
The White House spokesman said government leaks are “a frequent occurrence” in any administration, but he strongly suggested that the Obama White House wasn’t to blame for this one.
“I’m on the record as much as anybody in talking about the need to protect classified information,” Mr. Earnest said. “The White House has been extraordinarily conscientious in protecting classified information. The president’s proud of that.”
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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