There are real concerns within the intelligence community that foreign adversaries — including Russia and China — could target the growing ranks of recently fired federal employees for recruitment.
Agency officials are discussing this and warning colleagues and staff, sources tell ABC News.
“It’s not difficult for a foreign spy service to find a target for recruitment. They just simply have to go online and look at the postings of people who’ve recently been fired, who are angry and who are in need of money,” said John Cohen, former Department of Homeland Security acting undersecretary for intelligence and an ABC News contributor.
The agency seal on the floor of the lobby at the CIA, in Mclean, Va., Sept. 24, 2022.
Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images
“These large-scale layoffs and firing potentially could cause a counter-intelligence and security nightmare.”
Cohen added that if these types of large-scale layoffs were happening in Russia or China, the U.S. would also be working “aggressively” to identify individuals to recruit as intelligence assets.
The White House National Security Council did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
CNN reported earlier that foreign adversaries have recently directed their intelligence services to ramp up recruiting of fired federal employees who worked in national security, citing unnamed sources and a document produced by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. That document, according to CNN, said foreign intelligence officers were being directed to look for potential sources on LinkedIn, TikTok, RedNote and Reddit.
-ABC News’ Josh Margolin, Pete Madden, Kristen Red-Horse and Selina Wang
