The tsunami of executive orders emanating from the Trump White House can result in our missing something important. A “small” story about the removal of the three Democrats on the Private and Civil Liberties Board (PCLOB) is ominous. Their removal immediately results in the 5-member oversight board becoming inoperable. It now has four vacant seats and one remaining member, who cannot take any action as of now.
The PCLOB is an independent agency whose mission is the oversight of the intelligence community. Created by Congress, its 5-person board must be bipartisan, reflecting the congressional view that oversight is an apolitical function in which both parties should be invested. I know from my own time working for the FBI as its General Counsel that the Board was an indispensable and important body for conducting valuable oversight. The board asked tough questions (regardless of party) and conducted thorough reviews.
What makes the removal of the three board members significant is that Trump has embraced the idea that the FBI and the Intelligence Community needs greater oversight, latching onto admitted serious failures in the FISA process most notably discovered in the Carter Page FISA packages. In other words, Trump should want stronger, not weaker, oversight.
One might be tempted to say that Trump just wants to replace Board members with loyalists (as he appears to be doing throughout the executive branch), but the problem with that explanation is that two of the PCLOB members will have to be Democrats. Also, two of the members that the White House ordered removed today were appointed to the board by President Donald Trump in his first term (as noted by Charlie Savage).
A more ominous reading of what is afoot, is that now that he is in charge, Trump in fact wants less not more oversight. Accountability was for the Democratic administration, not his. Bottom line is that as of now there is one less independent body of smart, experienced people to root out wrongdoing and abuse.
Editor’s note: This piece is part of the Collection: Just Security’s Coverage of the Trump Administration’s Executive Actions