Trump escalates attack on Bruce Ohr
President threatens to revoke his security clearance “very soon”
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Friday attacked Bruce Ohr, a littleknown Justice Department official, calling him “a disgrace” and threatening to revoke his security clearance “very soon.”
Ohr, a career official who has worked on anti-drug and antigang initiatives at the department, has been targeted by conservative conspiracy theorists who say he helped start the investigation into Russian election interference. Ohr’s wife was at one time a contractor for Fusion GPS, which participated in compiling a dossier about Trump during the 2016 campaign.
Trump has embraced the conspiracy theory, casting Ohr and his wife, Nellie, as central players in what he calls the “rigged witch hunt” and accusing the couple of having what he claims are indirect contacts with Russians — apparently a reference to Christopher Steele, the British spy who compiled the dossier with the help of Russian sources.
“They should be looking at Bruce Ohr, and his wife, Nellie, for dealing with, by the way, indirectly, Russians,” Trump said as he boarded Marine One for a fundraising trip to the Hamptons. Asked about Bruce Ohr’s security clearance, Trump added: “I think Bruce Ohr is a disgrace. I suspect I will be taking it away very quickly.”
On Tuesday, Trump had included Ohr in a list of names of political critics, mostly former intelligence officials, who the president said could soon lose their security clearances. Ohr is a current Justice Department employee, and the loss of his clearance could affect his employment. But his status as an employee also gives him due process rights.
Trump has been attacking Ohr and his wife repeatedly on Twitter in the days since conservative news outlets seized on the connection between the couple and the Steele dossier. Trump and his backers have falsely claimed that the dossier spawned the Russia investigation.
“Bruce Ohr of the ‘Justice’ Department (can you believe he is still there) is accused of helping disgraced Christopher Steele ‘find dirt on Trump.’ Ohr’s wife, Nelly, was in on the act big time — worked for Fusion GPS on Fake Dossier. @foxandfriends,” Trump wrote Tuesday, misspelling Nellie Ohr’s name.
Three days earlier, Trump tweeted his frustration that news organizations were not covering the story.
“The big story that the Fake News Media refuses to report is lowlife Christopher Steele’s many meetings with Deputy A.G. Bruce Ohr and his beautiful wife, Nelly,” the president wrote. “It was Fusion GPS that hired Steele to write the phony & discredited Dossier, paid for by Crooked Hillary & the DNC …”
On Friday, Trump expressed no regret for revoking the security clearance of John Brennan, the former CIA director, despite a torrent of criticism from former top intelligence officials for the past several presidents.
“I’ve gotten tremendous response for having done that, because security clearances are very important to me,” he told reporters. He said that he had “never respected” Brennan, who he claimed — falsely — never officially reported concerns about Russian election interference before he left office.
“It’s a disgusting thing, frankly,” Trump said.