CIA Director Mike Pompeo blistered WikiLeaks in a speech Thursday, calling WikiLeaks a “hostile intelligence service” aided by Russia and accused WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange of making “common cause with dictators.”
The former Kansas congressman was speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., his first public address since becoming director. He lamented the leak of classified materials, and criticized Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden, but levelled his harshest criticism at Assange and his organization.
“It is time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really is,” he said, “a non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia. In January of this year, our Intelligence Community determined that Russian military intelligence — the GRU — had used WikiLeaks to release data of U.S. victims that the GRU had obtained through cyber operations against the Democratic National Committee. And the report also found that Russia’s primary propaganda outlet, RT, has actively collaborated with WikiLeaks.”
Pompeo did not mention that U.S. intelligence also found that Russia was using its cyber operations against the DNC as part of a campaign to harm candidate Hillary Clinton and aid Donald Trump, who appointed Pompeo to his current job after winning the presidency.
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