Top spy defends whistleblower at center of inquiry

WASHINGTON — The whistleblower who raised alarms about President Donald Trump pressing a foreign leader to investigate a Democratic candidate for president “did the right thing” and “followed the law every step of the way,” the nation’s top intelligence official told Congress on Thursday.

Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, called the whistleblower’s complaint “totally unprecedented” because it alleged that the president had endangered national security for personal gain over a period of several months.

But he appeared at odds with the White House, and most Republicans on the committee, by defending the still-unidentified intelligence official who wrote the nine-page complaint, and the inspector general who deemed it credible and urgent.

“I believe that the whistleblower and the inspector general have acted in good faith throughout. I have every reason to believe that they have done everything by the book and followed the law,” Maguire said.

During a sometimes testy three-hour hearing, Maguire denied accusations from Democrats that he engaged in partisan politics when he initially suppressed the complaint, an action that helped spur impeachment proceedings against the president this week.

Maguire conceded that “there is an allegation of a cover-up” in the complaint, as Democrats alleged.

“But right now, all we have is an allegation — an allegation with secondhand information from a whistleblower. I have no knowledge on whether or not that is true and accurate statement,” he said.

Republicans defended Maguire’s actions, questioned the whistleblower’s motives and accused Democrats of using the issue to smear the president. Only one Republican suggested he was troubled by Trump’s apparent efforts to solicit Ukraine’s help in the 2020 election.

“This is not OK,” said Rep. Michael R. Turner, ROhio. “That conversation is not OK, and I think it’s disappointing to the American public when they read this transcript.”

Maguire frustrated Democrats when he refused to say whether he had discussed the complaint with Trump, saying they speak regularly about intelligence and their conversations are privileged. But he said that Trump never asked him for the whistleblower’s name, and that he does not know the person’s identity.

At times Maguire, a retired Navy admiral, seemed uncertain, pointing out that he had been named to his post only six weeks ago and that the whistleblower’s complaint landed on his desk on the second day.

“I am the acting director of national intelligence, and I was still using Garmin to get to work,” he said, referring to a navigation device.

The original complaint, dated Aug. 12, was handed to the House and Senate intelligence committees Wednesday and released to the public Thursday.

It argues that Trump was “using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 U.S. election” by trying to pressure Ukraine to investigate his political enemies, especially Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.