By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
CIA Director John Brennan revealed that he was once a communist sympathizer in the mid-1970s because he was disgusted by Watergate and the political landscape that helped produce it.
Brennan was in college at the time and voted for Communist Party nominee Gus Hall, New York Magazine reports.
By 1980, Brennan said he was no longer a Communist sympathizer and realized that capitalism was a far better system.
Brennan said he “froze” when he was taking a polygraph test when entering the CIA.
“This was back in 1980, and I thought back to a previous election where I voted, and I voted for the Communist Party candidate.”
Brennan added, “I said I was neither Democratic or Republican, but it was my way, as I was going to college, of signaling my unhappiness with the system, and the need for change. I said I’m not a member of the Communist Party, so the polygrapher looked at me and said, ‘OK,’ and when I was finished with the polygraph and I left and said, ‘Well, I’m screwed.’”
Despite his past, he received national security clearance.
Other Stories of Interest
- FBI Unlikely to Proceed with Brad Pitt Child Abuse Investigation
- Terrorism And ‘the Unknown’ Keep Top FBI Official in D.C. Awake at Night
- What It’s Like to Patrol U.S.-Mexico Border in Arizona
- DEA Agent’s Murder in Mexico Unhealed Wound for Ex-Fresno Partner
- CIA Found ‘Convincing Evidence’ Chilean Dictator Was Behind 1976 D.C. Attack
