President Biden will not be the final word on whether former President Donald Trump continues to receive intelligence briefings, the White House spokeswoman said.
Biden, in a clip from an interview with CBS News released Friday, said Trump should not be privy to US secrets “because of his erratic behavior unrelated to the insurrection,” referring to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
But White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement on Saturday: “The president was expressing his concern about former president Trump receiving access to sensitive intelligence, but he also has deep trust in his own intelligence team to make a determination about how to provide intelligence information if at any point the former president Trump requests a briefing.”
Asked by anchor Nora O’Donnell on what his worst fear is in allowing Trump continued access to US intelligence, Biden said he’d rather not “speculate out loud.”
”I just think that there is no need for him to have that intelligence briefing. What value is giving him an intelligence briefing? What impact does he have at all, other than the fact he might slip and say something?” Biden said.
Ex-presidents and other former senior officials customarily retain access to classified information.
