Trump Should (Again) Cancel Open Intelligence Hearings on Worldwide Threats Trump should cancel open worldwide threat hearings, which have become security risks and political spectacles used by Democrats to undermine his administration. By Fred Fleitz
Like previous years, Democrats used the recent “Signal-gate” affair to turn this week’s unclassified hearings on worldwide threats by the Senate and House intelligence committees into political circuses that did nothing to conduct critical oversight of America’s intelligence agencies.
This is why, as he did in 2019, President Trump should cancel all future open worldwide threat hearings by refusing to allow his intelligence officials to participate in them.
Worldwide threat hearings are held annually and feature top U.S. intelligence officials presenting testimony on the analysis of their agencies on a wide range of security threats facing our nation. Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, FBI Director Kash Patel, NSA Director Timothy Haugh, and DIA Director Jeffrey Kruse testified to this year’s worldwide threat hearings.
These hearings are conducted in open, unclassified hearings followed by closed, classified sessions. There has long been concern that the open hearings pose significant and unnecessary security risks because America’s top intelligence officials discuss the current work of their agencies in front of the press. Despite assurances that this testimony is unclassified, it still provides extremely useful information to America’s adversaries on the focus, scope, and emphasis of U.S. intelligence. There is no question that videos of these hearings are closely watched and studied by hostile governments and their intelligence services.
The worldwide threats hearings have also become political spectacles that members of Congress often use to undermine presidential policy and gain face time on TV to promote themselves. Instead of using these hearings to understand dire security threats, committee members sometimes give self-serving speeches, bully witnesses, and press them to contradict presidential policies.
A January 29, 2019, worldwide threat hearing by the Senate Intelligence Committee angered President Trump because Democratic members coaxed DNI Dan Coats and CIA Director Gina Haspel to contradict Trump’s foreign policy positions by stating that his North Korea and Iran policies were likely to fail, Iran was in compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal, and that ISIS had not been defeated.
These were not intelligence judgments—Coats and Haspel inappropriately meddled in policy matters at the 2019 hearing. In response, I wrote at the time that the president should cancel these hearings and recommended that Trump fire DNI Coats. I was delighted when President Trump took both actions. (Full disclosure: The president also interviewed me to replace Coats.)
After the farcical threat hearings held this week by the Senate and House intelligence committees, it is time for President Trump to cancel these hearings again.
This week’s House and Senate intelligence committee hearings on worldwide threats were among the most politicized and irresponsible congressional hearings I have ever seen. Instead of asking questions about the U.S. Intelligence Community’s 2025 unclassified threat assessment report, Democratic members used the hearings to grandstand against the Signal-gate affair to inflict as much damage as possible to President Trump’s national security policies.
The Signal-gate affair concerns the use of the Signal chat app by senior Trump national security officials to discuss the recent U.S. bombing of the Houthi rebels in Yemen, as well as the accidental inclusion of Atlantic writer Jeffrey Goldberg in this Signal chat. This controversy began after Goldberg revealed in an article that he had been inadvertently added to the chat, alleged that classified information had been mishandled, and released screenshots of the chat. National Security Adviser Michael Waltz, who organized the Signal chat, admitted he made a mistake in including Goldberg. Although it appears that the use of Signal for this chat discussion complied with security regulations put in place by the Biden administration, the Trump administration is studying these regulations and assessing how to best protect sensitive and classified communications by senior Trump administration officials.
I agree with Trump officials that this was a mistake and a minor incident. They have stressed that the Yemen bombings were a success, no sensitive U.S. intelligence was compromised, and the publication of the Signal chat did not put U.S. lives at risk.
Given the many grave global threats facing our country, one would have expected some questions about the Signal affair at the beginning of the hearings, followed by intensive questioning about the Intelligence Community’s 2025 threat assessment.
That’s not what happened. The hearings went off the rails over the Signal-gate affair because of harassing and accusatory questioning by Democratic members to get TV soundbites to damage Trump’s foreign policy. They accused Trump officials of being “reckless” and of “mind-boggling” and “unprofessional behavior” for the Signal app chat about the Yemen bombing. There were calls for resignations. There were also unfounded accusations that U.S. troops were put at risk and that China and Russia could have obtained information from the chat.
One House Intelligence Committee member, Jimmy Gomez (D-CA), posed an outrageous and defamatory question when he asked the witnesses, “To your knowledge, do you know whether Pete Hegseth had been drinking before he leaked classified information?”
There are already strong national security reasons to cancel future open worldwide threat hearings. Since Democrats proved this week that they plan to use such hearings only to attack the Trump administration and not to conduct serious intelligence oversight, it is crucial that President Trump put a stop to these hearings immediately by barring his intelligence officials from attending them.
To enable Congress to conduct much-needed intelligence oversight without compromising or politicizing U.S. national security, worldwide threat hearings should, in the future, be held only in closed, classified sessions until congressional Democrats agree to act responsibly and cease abusing open intelligence hearings for political purposes.
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Fred Fleitz previously served as National Security Council chief of staff, CIA analyst, and a House Intelligence Committee staff member.
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