Retired CIA station chief Scott Uehlinger claims there is a “Deep State.”  He argued, “The Deep State is made up of thousands of similarly credentialed, remarkably “un-diverse” civil servants and political appointees who saw themselves promoted rapidly during the eight years of the Obama administration. The appointees have left, but make no mistake — the progressive civil servants remain.”  Uehlinger is correct except for the fact that he exaggerates the role Obama has played in its creation.  The “Deep State” had its greatest growth during the Roosevelt Administration when bureaucrats like Soviet asset Harry Dexter White recruited large numbers of communists and progressives to man the government.  Most of the communists were eventually weeded out of government but the progressives for the most part remained.  These progressives gradually gained control of most of the federal bureaucracy.  Under President Obama, even many of the conservative holdouts were driven from the government.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke claims nearly one-third of the employees at his department are not loyal to him and President Trump.  He claimed, “I got 30 percent of the crew that’s not loyal to the flag.”  Either the Department of Interior is a radical exception or Zinke is being extremely optimistic.  There are a large number of professionals in the Department of the Interior who will carry out orders regardless of the administration directing them.  There are even some extremely patriotic employees.  However, particularly in the leadership, there is a significant number of progressives who will actively sabotage efforts by a conservative administration to curtail government interference in the lives of its citizens.  What percentage of the upper echelons of the federal bureaucracy voted for Donald Trump?  That number is exceedingly small.

One of the most crucial fields that a president must rely upon is intelligence.  The NSA, FBI and CIA are in many respects the eyes and ears of a president.  These agencies are also the most compromised.  The heads of each of these agencies have intentionally misled the public and even lied before Congress.  CIA director John Brennan lied when he claimed, “Let me assure you the CIA was in no way spying on [the committee] or the Senate.”  He was later forced to apologize for his statement.  Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told the Congress that the NSA was not collecting information on millions of Americans.  Documents leaked by Edward Snowden revealed that he had lied.  FBI Director James Comey lied to Congress about his decision not to recommend criminal charges against Hillary Clinton.

The departments that oversee these agencies are also compromised.  This was illustrated by the recent release of Department of Justice documents by Judicial Watch.  These documents showed strong support by top DOJ officials for former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates’ refusal to enforce President Trump’s Middle East travel ban executive order.  Andrew Weissmann, one of Robert Mueller’s top prosecutors applauded Yates emailing: “I am so proud. And in awe. Thank you so much. All my deepest respects.”  Yates was subsequently fired for disobeying a direct order from the President.  The documents contain numerous emails sent from official Justice Department email addresses.   One was from DOJ Civil Division Appellate Attorney Jeffrey Clair who wrote, “Thank you AG Yates. I’ve been in civil/appellate for 30 years and have never seen an administration with such contempt for democratic values and the rule of law. The President’s order is an unconstitutional embarrassment and I applaud you for taking a principled stand against defending it.”  Of course Clair wrote this before the Supreme Court ruled that the travel ban was constitutional. 

John Dietrich is a freelance writer and the author of The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Policy (Algora Publishing).  He has a Master of Arts Degree in International Relations from St. Mary’s University.  He is retired from the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Department of Homeland Security.