California Rep. Adam Schiff said the United States intelligence community should "dumb down" information within classified briefings if former President Donald Trump secures the Republican nomination during the Republican National Convention (RNC).
Schiff made his remark during a Sunday appearance on NBC News' Meet the Press with host Kristen Welker.
Welker noted intelligence agencies planned to provide briefings to Trump if he officially secures the Republican nomination for president, and asked Schiff if he believed the move was "appropriate."
"That is the practice, but we've never had a situation where another candidate for president has been so criminally negligent ... if not worse, when it comes to handling classified information," Schiff said. "I have to hope, and knowing the intelligence community as I do, that they will dumb down the briefing for Donald Trump."
Schiff said the intelligence community should give Trump no more information than "absolutely necessary."
"Nothing that would reveal sources or methods, because we can't trust that he will do the right thing with that information," Schiff said, adding the former president has been "reckless" with classified information.
"It does concern me," Schiff said, noting the move was part of a "long tradition" for presidential nominees. "They will be wary of him, and they should."
Last June, the Department of Justice indicted Trump on his handling of classified documents. Trump asserted his innocence in a series of Truth Social posts at the time.
“The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been Indicted, seemingly over the Boxes Hoax, even though Joe Biden has 1850 Boxes at the University of Delaware, additional Boxes in Chinatown, D.C., with even more Boxes at the University of Pennsylvania, and documents strewn all over his garage floor where he parks his Corvette, and which is ‘secured’ by only a garage door that is paper thin, and open much of the time,” Trump wrote in the first of three posts to Truth Social.
Trump said he was summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday at 3 p.m.:I have been summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, at 3 PM. I never thought it possible that such a thing could happen to a former President of the United States, who received far more votes than any sitting President in the History of our Country, and is currently leading, by far, all Candidates, both Democrat and Republican, in Polls of the 2024 Presidential Election. I AM AN INNOCENT MAN!”
Trump declared, “This is indeed a DARK DAY for the United States of America. We are a Country in serious and rapid Decline, but together we will Make America Great Again!”
