President Trump is known for taking the simplest of approaches for his daily White House routine, which includes hours of reportedly ballooning “executive time” (i.e., tweeting and TV watching), so it’s not shocking to hear that he whittles every duty down as much as possible. He’s also been referred to as the “two-minute man” due to his short attention span, so it could arrive as little surprise to learn that he may be cutting corners on how he receives his daily intake of U.S. intelligence matters.
The Washington Post reports that Trump does not — unlike his last seven predecessors — generally read the President’s Daily Brief and instead opts for an oral intelligence briefing (which suits his “style of learning”) on the major points. This could, if true, prompt disastrous results in a crisis:
The arrangement underscores Trump’s impatience with exhaustive classified documents that go to the commander in chief — material that he has said he prefers condensed as much as possible. But by not reading the daily briefing, the president could hamper his ability to respond to crises in the most effective manner, intelligence experts warned.
The Washington Post bases their report upon three sources who are “familiar with the briefings,” but both Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats and National Security Council spokesman Michael Anton have gone on record to dispute the report. According to Coats, the notion of Trump only relying on an oral briefing is “pure fiction.”
Still, folks are likely to believe this report due to previous revelations that Trump supposedly never read an executive order that named Steve Bannon to a top National Security Council seat. And there were all those buzzings that NATO leaders stuck to short speeches to cater to Trump’s famous flighty tendencies. Perhaps Trump will clear the air with a tweet? He just might.
(Via Washington Post)