Fact Check: Are there "Threats of Treason at the CIA?"

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Career politician and CIA figurehead John Ratcliffe recently made comments to Fox News, in a February 26, 2025 article titled “Ratcliffe shrugs off concerns about potential threat of fired agents armed with CIA's secrets.”

"Any individual who would be willing to sell the Nation’s secrets to a foreign adversary has no place working at the Agency that plays an incredible role in keeping Americans safe every day," Ratcliffe told Fox News Digital in a statement. …

"You’re telling me that a professional setback could cause people to risk the consequences of treason and betray their country, and your argument is that those are the kind of people who should stay inside CIA?" a source familiar with the CIA head’s thinking added to Fox News Digital.

"There’s a general sense that it’s more of a justification for maintaining the status quo, but if potential traitors are there, it’s hard to argue the solution is for them to continue maintaining access to the nation’s secrets."

All of this was based on an article in CNN, Fox explained.

CNN reported on Monday that mass firings and buyouts offered to agents were under discussion among CIA "top leadership," who were apparently worried that losing their jobs might prompt disgruntled former officers to take their classified intelligence to foreign intelligence services like those of China or Russia.

But what did the CNN article say? This article was titled “How Trump’s government-cutting moves risk exposing the CIA’s secrets,” on February 24, 2025.

The CNN article only said that the CIA employees were “at risk,” not making any threats, however.

The agency is now considering whether some of the employees listed in the email to the White House who were previously slated for covert deployments in sensitive locations overseas should now be held back or reassigned, sources familiar with the matter said, because the risk that their identity may have been exposed to foreign government hackers is too high.

There is also a concern that some US embassy positions that are actually filled by CIA officers under cover may now be at risk of being revealed — potentially angering the host nation and exposing companies or endangering CIA assets who are known to have met with past occupants of the role.

The article quoted one “US official” who said that exposing CIA employees was “rolling the dice.”

“Terminating someone who works for Department of Agriculture — even if they’re disgruntled, if they’re not accessing classified information, what’s the risk?” one US official said.

With the CIA and other intelligence agencies, “you take whatever number of employees who are gonna get cut loose and they have knowledge of sensitive programs — that by definition is an insider risk,” this person said. “You’re just rolling the dice that these folks are gonna honor their secrecy agreement and not volunteer to a hostile intelligence service.”

They didn’t roll that dice, Mr. Ratcliffe. You did. Fact check: There are no threats of Treason within the CIA. They are simply explaining the risks to their careers, the National Security of the United States, and their own lives.

The Treason is yours, Mr. Ratcliffe. It took you about two weeks on the job to do this, now didn’t it?

"Any individual who would be willing to sell the Nation’s secrets to a foreign adversary has no place working at the Agency that plays an incredible role in keeping Americans safe every day,"

You got that right.

Charles Wright