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Intelligence community calls withholding intel “an absurd fantasy” — the same day Hillary wishes out loud they were doing exactly that; Firings!; Slaughter; feds’ end-run around Chicago’s Safe-T Act.
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Good morning, C&C, it’s Monday! I trust everyone enjoyed a safe and patriotic Fourth of July this weekend (without any side trips to the urgent care center). Your post-holiday-weekend roundup includes: the intelligence community swearing —anonymously, naturally— that it would neverslow-walk a directive, the same day Hillary Clinton hopped on a podcast to beg them to do exactly that; acting DNI Bill Pulte ending the debate by firing “dozens” of them over one long weekend, courtesy of the Supreme Court’s Slaughterdecision and Trump’s freshly-signed Schedule F; a “badgeless” eleven-agency federal strike force sweeping Chicago —305 fugitives bagged, two dozen missing kids recovered— to jail the repeat offenders that Cook County’s Safe-T Act judges keep turning loose; and the DOJ stripping citizenship from a casting call of terrorists, war criminals, and spies who lied their way onto the naturalization rolls. Grab your coffee.
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🔥🔥🔥 We begin today’s roundup with a delightfully crystal-clear example of The Boomerang. For weeks, we’ve been tracking the intelligence community’s slow-rolling bureaucratic temper tantrum, centered on the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). You remember. Tulsi Gabbard stepped down and President Trump’s so-called “bulldog” Bill Pulte stepped into post. Cue hysteria. Welp. It’s FAFO time. Friday, MS-Now reported, “Acting DNI Bill Pulte begins firing dozens of intelligence officials.”
This completely predictable development shocked the intelligence community. They were shocked! How could this happen?? They’d laughed merrily at the notion of Bill Pulte —haha! The mortgage guy!— walking in and penetrating their spooky tradecrafted fog of trickery, double-agentry, and deceit. They planned to slow-roll Bill into a giant wiener schnitzel of confusing and contradictory signals, until Trump was long gone. Easy. They’ve done it many times before.
Their plan was right in the quotes from the MS-Now story. “This isn’t a guy who is familiar with intelligence,” one anonymous former intelligence official mused. “How is he going to get to the bottom of this and rely on any information with a matter of fidelity?”
He wondered how Pulte could even possibly know whether information was being withheld, since Bill isn’t an intelligence insider. He’s no expert! “It would be like me taking over a hospital and firing dozens of surgeons in a matter of days,” the official complained. (A terrible analogy. If surgeons refused to tell the hospital director which patients they were operating on, firing them would be the first step. Duh.)
Nevertheless, and despite Bill’s asymmetric informational disadvantage, the story explained that, within two weeks of being appointed, “Dozens of intelligence officials began receiving notice of their terminations on Thursday under Bill Pulte, the new acting director of national intelligence.”
Dozens. That’s the most precise number we have from any outlet. But we know they sometimes underestimate these kinds of things. Just on Friday, the New York Times deployed the term “scores” to refer to two hundred and sixty FBI analysts assigned to Fulton County for the 2020 election audit. So … “dozens” of fired IC officials could be hundreds.
Apparently, the Trump Admin isn’t saying. (Or, at least, the reporter didn’t ask, and instead collected five anonymous sources without knowledge to give their opinions. There used to be a term for a ‘news’ story with no facts, relying on all anonymous sources, none of whom have personal knowledge. Propaganda.)
Why were they fired? “Leadership alleges that the fired workers,” MS-Now reported, “have not provided complete pictures of available intelligence.” Resistance.
Now, pay attention. The article laughed derisively at any notion that our hardworking, patriotic, non-partisan intelligence officials would be anything but enthusiastically cooperative. “The premise is absurd,” one of the former officials was quoted saying.
“A third former senior intelligence official,” the article assured readers, “dismissed the idea that intelligence officials would everengage in such conduct.” He called the very idea “a fantasy,” and sneered, “the intelligence community is comprised of committed professionals.” They’re committed to something, all right.
“Intelligence officers,” said a fourth anonymous blabberer, “approach their work in a nonpolitical way and deeply resent the idea that doing so somehow confirms the idea there is some kind of a deep state.” They resent the very notion. They resent it. It’s an absurd fantasy!
🔥 Once I stopped laughing at the idea of four anonymous deep-staters sneering at the idea of a deep state —from within the deep state— I glanced back just four days at C&C’s July 2nd edition. Not even a week ago, I reported the literal precursor to today’s story, from the New York Times.
A fight was building! A “fight” sure sounds like the kind of resistance that they now say is absurd. A fight over what? Over a list. Which list? A list of spies and targets. Officially, the explanation was that Bill Pulte wanted to make sure the eighteen alphabet agencies would stop accidentally tripping over each other in dark alleys when ‘unfortunate misunderstandings’ could happen.
But I suggested that a better explanation might be that the Trump Administration, for some bizarre reason, didn’t trust the intelligence community (maybe because of what happened last time), and —just double-checking— wanted to confirm “Donald J. Trump” has been removed from the lists of targets, and “Christopher Steele” from the lists of sources.
In a rare moment of random transparency, the Times accidentally told the truth: “For the F.B.I., such a master list of espionage targets would include those the bureau wants to investigate and perhaps someday arrest.” Like Trump? “For the C.I.A., it would include a significant number of potential assets.” Like Christopher Steele?
Anyway, the Times explained that the agencies were, don’t laugh, not precisely enthusiastic. Indeed, the Times said they remained “skeptical“ of any need for a list in the first place. You don’t need it. Just trust us. The Gray Lady added, not surprisingly, that so far, Pulte’s effort to get hold of the list had been —wait for it— “mostly unsuccessful.”
Since MS-Now reported that it would be an absurd fantasy to think our ‘committed,’ professional, and non-partisan intelligence agencies would ever play politics and use bureaucratic games to avoid sharing information, one can only chalk the “mostly unsuccessful” effort up to bad luck. (Cue eyeroll.)
🔥 Translation: They have something to hide. The only question is what. The intelligence community, which literally justleaked five anonymous agents to MS-Now, says it worries that the ODNI might leak the names of their spooks and targets.
But it gets even better. The Times also noted that officials said they couldn’t even agree on “how a list of what are known as foreign intelligence threat actors would be created, maintained and kept secure.”
I am not making this up. The people whose literal, singular job is to secure the nation’s most sensitive secrets are claiming they don’t know how to securely maintain a list. It’s like a librarian claiming they don’t know how to alphabetize or use decimal systems. So complicated!
If they honestly can’t figure out how to keep a spreadsheet secure, they should be fired. Moron, meet pink slip.
🔥 But wait, the irony compounds! Because, at the very same time these anonymous “non-partisan professionals” were clutching their handbags and swearing they would never ever withhold information or slow-walk a directive, guess who popped up on a podcast to encourage them to do exactly that?
The former Secretary of State and failed presidential candidate, Hillary “Pantsuit” Clinton!
In Friday’s scaremongering article (the same day!) titled, “Hillary Clinton knocks Pulte: ‘We should definitely be worried about everything’”, the Hill reported Hillary’s appearance on Marc Elias’s unwatchable “Defending Democracy” podcast. (Elias, you might remember, was the Democrat lawyer who funded the Steele Dossier. Good times.)
Hillary complained that Pulte’s appointment was a “naked partisan takeover,” and then she said the best part. Out loud. “I mean, I hope there are career and even political appointees, in various of the agencies, that are slow-walking or refusing to share information with Pulte.”
Haha! Let us pause and savor the majestic, sweeping hypocrisy of this moment.
Anonymous IC Official: “It is an absurd fantasy and an insult to suggest we would ever slow-walk or withhold information!”
Hillary Clinton: “I really hope you guys are slow-walking and withholding information!”
On the same day that offended officials were anonymously insisting on their professionalism and nonpartisanship, Hillary literally told them to do the exact thing they are currently getting fired for doing, while they are simultaneously denying they are doing it. It was like a Jake Blues excuse cascade, except in a SCIF instead of a sewer culvert.
Which brings us to the unavoidable “I told you so” portion of today’s broadcast.
🔥 Last week, when these agencies decided to slow-walk Pulte’s request —trying to pull a bureaucratic Catch-22 where they are cooperating, of course, but the list always remains one more committee meeting away— I said Pulte would simply start firing people.
After all, the Trump administration has not exactly been shy about handing out pink slips to the administrative state.
It took one single holiday weekend. Faster than even I had imagined possible, Bill Pulte’s chopping ax started felling intelligence trees.
According to one of the anonymous intelligence officials (i.e., leakers), Pulte began terminating the ‘dozens’ of officials who, leadership believes, have “not provided complete pictures of available intelligence.”
The reaction from the Intelligence Community (IC) has been a masterclass in Confident Wrongness, delivered with the indignant sputtering of a teenager asked to clean their room. MS NOW found four—count ‘em, four!—former senior intelligence officials to express their absolute shock and horror that anyone would accuse the IC of withholding information.
But hang on a moment. There’s one more dot to toss on the pile.
🔥 Remember SCOTUS’s “biggest case” last week? It bore the delightful caption Trump v. Slaughter, and reversed the 150-year-old case of Humphrey’s Executor, giving Trump full control of Executive Branch staffing. Also on Friday —just before the IC pink slips started going out— GovExec published this eye-popping headline:
With the terrific Slaughter decision in hand, President Trump wasted no time. Here’s a link to his Friday executive order, blandly titled “Implementing Schedule Policy/Career in the Excepted Service.” (Note: “Schedule F” has now been renamed to “Schedule Policy/Career.”)
It was a slaughter. “Employees placed into the new schedule,” the article explained, “would no longer be able to challenge adverse personnel actions before the Merit Systems Protection Board.”
In English: instead of it taking two years of detailed procedures and a small army of lawyers to purge a hostile bureaucrat —always with the risk that some MSPB judge will say you can’t— now Trump can just … fire them. Buh bye.
In other words, when MS‑Now tells you that Pulte has begun firing ‘dozens’ of intel officials, you’re not watching a random tantrum. You’re watching the Supreme Court’s unitary‑executive doctrine and Trump’s new Schedule Policy/Career do exactly what they were designed to do—turn slow‑motion civil‑service trench warfare into same‑day pink slips.
This intelligence community massacre has been years in the making. Trump launched Schedule F in October, 2020— weeks before he left office, and just before the 2020 election loss. Biden immediately reversed it in his First Day Orders. (Or the Autopen did, but that is a side issue.)
And if you’re wondering how Bill Pulte is suddenly able to hand ‘dozens’ of intelligence officials their walking papers, that’s not a mystery at all— that’s what Schedule Policy/Career was built to do. They were just waiting for Slaughter.
“To show the importance of the Slaughter Case,” Trump tweeted last week, “90 years of precedent has been COMPLETELY AND UNEQUIVOCALLY OVERRULED, greatly increasing Presidential Power at a time when it is most needed!” He continued, “Today’s Historic Slaughter Decision by the Supreme Court is the Greatest Increase in Presidential Power in the last 100 years. Such a Monumental Ruling at such an important time!”
Best of luck with the job search, anonymous intelligence officials. Maybe Hillary is hiring.
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Last week, the Department of Justice announced the dramatic, if not historic, results of “Operation New Dawn,” a massive, multi-agency sweep in the Chicago area. People Magazine reported, “305 People Arrested, 179 Charged and 24 Missing Children Recovered in Massive Operation in Chicago.”
The DOJ’s own press release explained the historic nature of the operation. Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney Andrew S. Boutros launched what he called a “badgeless” operation. Eleven federal agencies —including the FBI, ATF, DEA, and Homeland Security Investigations— set aside their turf wars, dropped their individual agency shields, and operated under the single banner of the United States flag.
In just 60 days, this federal super-team charged 179 defendants, apprehended 305 known fugitives, and rescued 24 missing children.
It is a staggering achievement. But if you just read the press releases, you miss the real story. The media frame is “Feds Crack Down on Crime.” But why did the Feds have to crack down so hard, in this specific way, right now?
To find the answer, we have to look at who they are charging.
Consider the case of Lawrence Reed. In November 2025, Reed approached a 26-year-old woman sitting quietly on a CTA Blue Line train, doused her in gasoline, and set her on fire. When she tried to run, he cornered her and set her on fire again.
It was a horrific, random act of violence. But the real horror is Reed’s background. As CBS News reported, Reed had been arrested more than 70 times. He had eightfelony convictions. And at the exact moment he allegedly set that young woman on fire, he was out on the streets wearing an ankle monitor.
Why was he on an ankle monitor? Because just months earlier, Reed had violently attacked a social worker at a psychiatric hospital. Overriding strong objections from local prosecutors, a Cook County judge released him anyway. Because under Illinois’s “Safe-T Act” —the state’s disastrous foray into eliminating cash bail— judges have broad discretion to release violent repeat offenders back into the wild.
This brings us to the money quote. As widely noted on social media, U.S. Attorney Boutros didn’t just charge chronic offender Reed with arson or assault. He charged him federally with terrorism on a mass transportation system. Here is Reed’s victim, who spent months in the hospital recovering from the horrific attack:
US Attorney Boutros made it explicitly clear why he was doing it. Speaking specifically about Reed, Boutros said: “An individual who had over 100 arrests! Frankly, the Cook County judges failed the people of ND Illinois and failed to detain them.” That, my friends, was the buried lede.
Operation New Dawn wasn’t just a crime sweep. It was a massive, coordinated federal bypass around Chicago’s corrupt and broken judicial system.
The local Cook County judges, armed with the Safe-T Act, refuse to keep violent, repeat offenders behind bars. Police keep catching them, and judges keep releasing them. So the Trump administration built a “badgeless” federal strike force —a historic multi-agency operation— to swoop in, scoop up the worst of the worst, and charge them federally, where Cook County judges can’t touch them and the Safe-T Act doesn’t apply.
The Trump Administration isn’t really fighting crime. It is really fighting the local judiciary, using a brilliant, ruthless Leverage Play.
Guess what happens when you actually lock up violent criminals instead of giving them cash-free bail and a stern talking-to? Crime goes down. Chicago is currently boasting about record-low homicide numbers for 2025, dropping to levels not seen since 1965.
The local politicians will try to take credit, but the reality is that the Feds are doing the heavy lifting by removing the apex predators from the ecosystem. That wasn’t all. Behold the intersection of crime and border enforcement.
🔥 Speaking of removing predators, the DOJ dropped another historic press release in May, but it remains relevant: “Justice Department Moves to Denaturalize 12 Individuals for Concealing Terrorist Support, War Crimes, Espionage, Sexual Abuse, and More.” A month later, Time reported a second batch: “Trump Administration Moves to Strip Citizenship From 17 People.” Taking the 12 from May, adding 18 more in June, the DOJ is already breaking all historic records:
Stopping them at the border is one thing. Deporting illegals is another. But what can you do when they’ve already got their citizenship? The Trump administration is aggressively using the Immigration and Nationality Act to strip the citizenship of some very bad people who lied on their naturalization forms about, you know, being literal terrorists and war criminals.
Historically, denaturalization was rare. It was used as a last‑resort tool, usually in ones and twos, often for things like Nazi war crimes or serious fraud. Between 1990–2017, the DOJ filed an average of about eleven denaturalization cases per year, in total, not per batch. Just May’s single batch of twelve cases was more than a full year’s normal volume, historically speaking.
For comparison, during a nearly 20-year period from January 2008 through April 2026, the DOJ processed 38 totaldenaturalization cases. Just in May and June, it has now prosecuted 28. These new cases have also charged offenses never before used as a basis to strip a legal immigrant of their citizenship, like communism, spying, marriage fraud, indecent conduct, healthcare fraud, and statutory rape of a minor.
The list of defendants reads like the casting call for a James Bond villain convention. You might fairly wonder how these people got citizenship at all. Let’s just take three examples.
We have Ali Yousif Ahmed Al-Nouri, 48, who came to the U.S. claiming his family was attacked by Al-Qaeda. Plot twist: Iraq wants him extradited because he allegedly was an Al-Qaeda leader who murdered at least two police officers.
We have Baboucarr Mboob, 58, who was naturalized in 2011. He somehow forgot to mention that in 1994, while serving in the Gambian army, he participated in the execution of six fellow officers without a trial. He admitted to it during a truth commission hearing in 2019. A literal war criminal. Oops.
And we have Khalid Ouazzani, 48, who swore his citizenship oath to the U.S. Constitution while actively planning to bomb the New York Stock Exchange and sending tens of thousands of dollars to Al-Qaeda.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche noted, “The Trump administration is taking action to correct these egregious violations of our immigration system.” Thank Heavens. “Gaining U.S. citizenship is a privilege, and under the steadfast leadership of President Trump,” Blanche added, “this Department of Justice maintains a zero-tolerance policy for the abuse of this process.”
For years, we were assured —assured!— that the vetting process for immigrants and refugees was flawless. “Extreme vetting,” they called it. In 2015, Obama’s Secretary of State John Kerry (D) sent a letter of reassurance to all 50 governors, stating, “In short, the security vetting for this population, the most vulnerable of individuals, is extraordinarily thorough and comprehensive.” Headline from CBS News, November 2015:
In short, that was a lie. Somehow the Democrats’’ flawless and rigorous system’ managed to pass out U.S. citizenship to a known Gambian execution squad member and an Al-Qaeda bomber.
This is the intersection of immigration law and national security, a locale that corporate media desperately wants everyone to ignore, which is why you haven’t heard this story. You haven’t even heard about activists’ complaints about denaturalization. The system didn’t just fail; it actively imported the very threats it was supposed to screen out. And somehow it always fails in the same direction.
It is impossible to overestimate the damage that Democrats’ immigration policies have inflicted on this nation.
Now, Todd Blanche’s DOJ is finally clearing the decks.” Denaturalization, once a rare occurrence in federal courts,” Trace Reportsexplained, “is now becoming increasingly common. This increase is expected to continue.” The best part is, the more they do, the easier it gets. “DOJ’s establishment of denaturalization as a civil enforcement priority has created the administrative processes and infrastructure to support an expansive system for civil denaturalization proceedings.”
“DHS will not stand idly by while Americans are harmed by criminals, including sex offenders, perpetrators of fraud, and drug traffickers who have exploited our generosity and gamed our immigration system,” DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin said. “We will continue to use every lawful avenue to denaturalize and remove aliens.”
Taking the Chicago story with the denaturalization stories, we see a terrific pattern emerging: batch prosecutions. The DOJ has always tackled these cases one by one or in small groups of related defendants. Now they are rounding up “dozens” of horrible criminals in bulk lots. It makes us wonder why previous DOJs worked at such relatively sluggish paces.
Anyway, be encouraged. True, much remains to be done, and sometimes it feels like trying to drain the ocean using a soup spoon. But at least they are using industrial pumps now. And most of all: it is alreadymaking a measurable and historic difference in the nation’s crime rates. In other words: it’s working.
Have a marvelous Monday! Come back tomorrow, for a terrific Tuesday roundup of Coffee & Covid’s essential news and caffeinated commentary.
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Rose Rambles... 