Is Trump's 'campaign of retaliation' about to get worse?

Adam Schiff.
(Image credit: Zach Gibson/Getty Images)

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) sent a letter Tuesday to acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell demanding he explain President Trump's recent dismissals of Michael Atkinson and Glenn Fine, the inspectors general of the intelligence community and the Pentagon, respectively. The Washington Post's Greg Sargent says how Grenell responds could be "incredibly telling" about the Trump administration's future plans.

In the letter, Schiff asks Grenell to confirm whether he exercised his "authority" to prohibit Atkinson from doing his job, aside from the fact that he was the official who brought the infamous whistleblower complaint about Trump's Ukraine conduct to Congress, eventually leading to the president's impeachment. Schiff also called on Grenell to commit to stopping any form of retaliation against anyone who makes "protected disclosures of misconduct."

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Tim O'Donnell

Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.