John Daniel

It's just that now it's Russian military intelligence.

The elephant trainer himself.

Susan Miller was one of the leaders of a team set up under the Obama administration in 2016 to report on the possibility that Putin's Russia were looking to influence the American election.

The report also said, Now, it's important to say that while they saw this evidence that Russia was trying to influence the election, that in itself is not new.

Russia has been running political interference campaigns forever.

And ultimately, they said that the Russian efforts were not enough to have made a difference.

So Donald Trump was the legitimate winner.

The Russia hoax.

And after the pressure on President Trump has built up for a while, he decides the public officials involved in the story are going to pay.

Susan Miller had to hire a lawyer at her own expense to defend herself against accusations from the first Trump administration.

Parking is clearly quite important at CIA.

Initially, Susan Miller thought this was some kind of bureaucratic cock-up that could be sorted out.

Finally, she gets an answer.

Although it doesn't feel like Donald Trump keeps his cards that close to his chest.

In any case, Susan Miller says the situation with President Trump isn't getting any better.

So from a New Zealand perspective, that sounds pretty chilling.

It should.

In an operational sense, Susan Miller says that Trumpian influence reaches down to the people who run CIA on a daily basis.

And remember, these are people who are effectively networked into our intelligence organisations here in New Zealand.

CIA's role has always been to stick close to the president.