There's perhaps no clandestine institution on Earth more storied than the CIA, but over the past three weeks, the agency's goals have shifted significantly as President Donald Trump continues his unprecedented efforts to reshape the federal government. Less than a month into the Trump administration, the Central Intelligence Agency finds itself in the president's rapidly changing crosshairs, joining the many federal programs that have offered employees legally dubious buyout offers. As Trump, who has long railed against a supposed "deep state" of nebulous law enforcement and national security interests, casts his attention toward the CIA, experts are left to wonder what the world's premier spy enterprise might look like should the president realize his vision.

Infusing the agency with 'renewed energy'
The buyout offers are a "signal to those who oppose Trump's agenda to find work elsewhere," said The Wall Street Journal. The goal is to "bring the agency in line with President Trump's priorities, including targeting drug cartels" and have a workforce suited to the agency’s "new goals, which also include Trump's trade war and undermining China." 

More broadly, Trump's vision for the agency is to have a "greater focus on the Western Hemisphere." The buyouts and shifting focus are part of a "holistic strategy to infuse the agency with renewed energy," a CIA spokesperson said to CBS News. 

'Radical, unplanned and self-contradictory'
The CIA's overarching mission of protecting U.S. interests "requires depth of thought, strategy and long-term planning," said The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Trump's plan to remake the agency exhibits "none of those qualities" and is instead "reactive, poorly designed and likely to achieve the opposite of its stated goal." 

Already there's "panic within the broader national security community," said NPR. Experts are worrying about the possibility that "years of experience, talent and secrets could soon be heading out the door." 

Crucially, none of the Trump administration's planned reforms "freeze the actual new and emerging threats" eager to "pounce on any perception of polarization or additional vulnerabilities," said the Robert Lansing Institute for Global Threats and Democratic Studies. It is "entirely possible," then, that a host of American adversaries "stand to benefit the most" from a pivot from "reasonable, dedicated, thoughtful and necessary reform and review toward a radical, unplanned and self-contradictory near-elimination of the intelligence agencies in their conventional sense."

A spate of plane crashes over the past couple of months have shaken the public's faith in the safety of air travel. The crash of a small medical plane in Philadelphia on Sunday, which killed seven people and injured at least 19 more, followed the midair collision of a plane and helicopter in Washington, D.C., which claimed the lives of 67, just four days before. And beyond the U.S., there were a couple of alarming high-profile crashes in December in Kazakhstan and South Korea. 

Are there more air accidents now? 
Despite recent high-profile incidents, commercial planes are still one of the safest modes of travel. Between 2018 and 2022, the fatality rate on commercial aircraft was just one per 13.7 million passengers, according to data from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Plane deaths are, in fact, rarer now than they were between 2008 and 2017 when there was roughly one death for every 7.9 million boardings. In 2024, despite several notable crashes, the overall global accident rate remained low, at approximately 1.3 per one million flights. 

What are the main causes of air accidents? 
Human error accounts for up to 80% of all aviation accidents, according to research from the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical Academy in Florida. Pilot mistakes contribute to 53% of cases, and mechanical failures are responsible for about 21% of accidents. Take-off and landing are the most dangerous moments of any flight, according to a study by plane manufacturer Airbus. 

What's the US doing?
The Trump administration will be making "rapid safety upgrades to the air traffic control system," Elon Musk said last night on X, confirming newly installed Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's announcement earlier in the day that Musk's DOGE team will "plug in" to the country's aviation infrastructure. The White House previously "blamed the hiring practices of the Federal Aviation Administration" for recent lapses in air system security, said Axios.