Outgoing CIA chief slams Trump’s ‘repugnant’ Nazi comparison

Outgoing CIA director John Brennan slammed President-elect Donald Trump for accusing the spy agency of leaking damaging information on him and comparing it to something Nazi Germany “would have done and did do.”

Two days after charging that Trump lacked a full understanding of national security interests, Brennan angrily rebuffed the incoming president’s use of Nazi imagery to tar the intelligence community.

“Tell the families of those 117 CIA officers who are forever memorialized on our wall of honor that their loved ones who gave their lives were akin to Nazis. Tell the CIA officers who are serving in harm’s way right now and their families who are worried about them that they are akin to Nazi Germany,” Brennan told the Wall Street Journal Monday.

“I found that to be very repugnant, and I will forever stand up for the integrity and patriotism of my officers who have done much over the years to sacrifice for their fellow citizens.”

Trump has suggested that the intelligence community is out to get him — including by the leak of a document containing potentially damaging, but unverified, financial and personal information on Trump.

In a tweet and later at a press conference, Trump compared the situation to “Nazi Germany.”

In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Brennan called that comparison “outrageous” and said the intelligence community wanted the president-elect to know that the document was circulating among some news outlets.

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal interview at the agency’s headquarters, Brennan said Trump’s comments had crossed a line.

Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to "leak" into the public. One last shot at me.Are we living in Nazi Germany?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017

“I think it’s the right and indeed the responsibility of the president of the United States to challenge the conclusions of the intelligence community,” Brennan said.

“We don’t expect our information and our assessments to be swallowed whole,” he said, but added, “It’s when there are allegations made about leaking or about dishonesty or a lack of integrity, that’s where I think the line is crossed.”

The comments continue Brennan’s criticism of the incoming president, who has feuded with US intelligence agencies over their belief that Russia worked to tilt the 2016 presidential election in his favor.

Trump is set to become the America’s 45th president at his Friday inauguration in Washington.

On Sunday, Brennan charged that Trump lacked a full understanding of the threat Moscow posed to the United States, delivering a public lecture to the president-elect that further highlighted the bitter state of Trump’s relations with the intelligence agencies.

“Now that he’s going to have an opportunity to do something for our national security as opposed to talking and tweeting, he’s going to have tremendous responsibility to make sure that US and national security interests are protected,” Brennan said on “Fox News Sunday,” warning that the president-elect’s impulsiveness could be dangerous.

“Spontaneity is not something that protects national security interests,” Brennan declared.

After Brennan’s comments on Fox, Trump wondered on Twitter whether Brennan himself had leaked the news of a dossier of allegations compiled against him by political opponents. He suggested Brennan might be “the leaker of Fake News.”

much worse – just look at Syria (red line), Crimea, Ukraine and the build-up of Russian nukes. Not good! Was this the leaker of Fake News?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 16, 2017

In the Wall Street Journal interview, published Monday, Brennan said he was not the leaker.

“First of all, this is not intelligence community information,” he told the newspaper, but had come to his attention from media outlets.