Former officer now has role overseeing CIA
Lawmaker’s work experience to aid in improving agency
As former CIA Director David Petraeus recently told the House Intelligence Committee about the needs of the agency’s workforce, one of the committee’s youngest members flashed a knowing smile and began to nod.
Abigail Spanberger spent almost a decade as a CIA operations officer. Now she’s a thirdterm Democratic congresswoman from Virginia who was just named to one of two committees that oversees the work of America’s spy agencies.
The relationship between Congress and the U. S. intelligence services can be uneasy and is often adversarial. That’s especially true now as lawmakers demand answers about classified documents found in the private possession of two presidents and the Biden administration’s response to a suspected Chinese spy balloon.
Years of high- profile fights over intelligence matters have taken a toll, with some Republicans accusing the agencies of being part of a “deep state” controlling U. S. politics.
Spanberger, 43, is part of a small group of former intelligence officers to have been elected to Congress. Like others with access to America’s top secrets, she will be called on to review intelligence matters in private and explain what she can to fellow lawmakers and the public.
“I know the lingo. I know the language. I know the culture,” Spanberger said. “I hope that helps me do my job better. But I’m sure there will be points of frustration probably for me and for them, frankly speaking.”
She rejects talk of a “deep state” and called on other lawmakers
not to promote conspiracy theories about intelligence or the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.
“The reality is other countries perceive that and they perceive that in a way that can’t be good,” she said. “As a former intelligence officer, I know that countries are watching us. I know because I wrote up those reports.”
At least two other former CIA officers became members of the committee — Republicans Will Hurd of Texas and Porter Goss of Florida, who was chairman before being named CIA director in 2004 under President George W. Bush.
In an interview, Goss described his experience with overseeing intelligence while in Congress as frustrating.
“The tensions are greater than when I was there,” he said, blaming polarization in Congress and within the spy agencies. “Most of the intelligence community doesn’t understand Congress, and most of Congress doesn’t understand the intelligence community.”
Spanberger’s background in intelligence and her moderate politics representing a swing district south and west of Washington
will be assets on the committee, Goss and Hurd said.
“She’s trustworthy,” said Hurd, who left Congress after the 2020 election. “Even when you don’t agree on something, you’re able to build trust with her, which is something I always appreciated. She’s someone that works hard and is focused on the mission.”
The daughter of a nurse and a federal law enforcement officer who also served in the Army, she says she was drawn to national service and the idea of learning new languages and cultures. Spanberger was a postal inspector before joining the CIA in 2006.
As an operations officer, Spanberger worked on cases ranging from counterterrorism to nuclear proliferation. The specifics of her cases remain classified.
Charlotte Mcwilliams met Spanberger when they were trainee officers before going to the CIA’S academy. They were sent on to overseas postings — Spanberger in Europe, Mcwilliams in Africa — and bonded over their shared experiences doing clandestine work while becoming new mothers at the same time.
“It was wonderful to have this dear friend who was working hard to kick butt as much as she could, professionally and personally at the same time,” Mcwilliams said.
After eight years, Spanberger had several choices for her next posting, from Kenya to Costa Rica. She says it was her daughter, then in kindergarten, who asked them if they could move back to Virginia. She decided ultimately to leave the CIA.
A few years later, during the 2016 presidential election, she started to discuss with her friends the possibility of running for office.
She ultimately targeted the congressional seat held by thenRep. Dave Brat, who had stunned House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the GOP primary four years earlier. Part of what informed her decision, she said, was her experience of “always being the one who believed that somebody somewhere was using the information I was collecting in really a productive way.”
When Spanberger went to a Democratic Party event to recruit and train future women candidates, Mcwilliams says, she was told by officials in Washington and Richmond, Va., that she should consider running a smaller race, perhaps for school board. “Even in that place where the whole point is they’re experts and they’re going to guide you, she had to advocate for herself,” said Mcwilliams.
Spanberger defeated Brat in 2018, winning a hotly contested race in which Republicans questioned her national security credentials and a stint as a substitute teacher at a school funded by the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Washington. A previous application she submitted for a security clearance was obtained by a conservative political group and shared with the press.
She since has won two more close races and been raised as a possible candidate for Virginia governor.