The politicization of intelligence products by intelligence officers or consumers long has been seen as inappropriate and unwise. It biases intelligence analyses, increases chances of major intelligence errors, and endangers policy-making. In recent years a new variety of politicization has emerged: the purposeful injection of ideology into intelligence agencies that alters organizational cultures and introduces new sources of analytic error. The most prominent example is the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies of U.S. Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, but evidence is growing of similar influences in Canada, the United Kingdom, and other European NATO countries.
Obama and Biden engineered politicization by issuing ideology-based executive orders that mandated DEI-related policies in federal agencies and appointing senior executives of intelligence agencies, such as CIA directors John Brennan and William Burns, who used command emphasis and bureaucratic incentives to embed DEI into agencies’ organizational culture, thereby influencing routine thought processes and actions. Means included promulgating formal policies, embedding DEI principles in employee rating standards, establishing offices dedicated to monitoring compliance with executive orders, and publishing The Dive, an initially classified magazine designed to tell employees how to think about people, organizations, and issues in ideologically correct ways. Aims and processes were publicly clear and were explicitly designed to change organizational cultures.
DEI is a major problem for Western democracies because it is an action arm of “critical race theory,” which is a product of the so-called Frankfurt School of what often is called “cultural Marxists” who aim, like Karl Marx but in different ways, to overthrow Western democratic governments and civilization, and replace them with Marxian utopias. DEI often is disingenuously disguised as a means to promote social justice.
Considerable evidence shows how DEI policies damage intelligence workforces and output. By many accounts, U.S. intelligence officers in recent years were hired, promoted, assigned, and given awards based on membership in large, visually identifiable demographic identity groups, not ability. DEI policies negatively affected interpersonal relations within agencies, damaging the cooperation important to do intelligence work. In the Obama/Biden years, opponents of DEI policies feared they would be punished by supporters of DEI and were careful about speaking candidly with colleagues. Brennan urged CIA personnel to be politically active in defense of DEI policies. The surge in leaks, including disinformation, in 2016-2021 and in 2025 reflects politically motivated employee actions against President Donald Trump.
We have less information about how these biases affect the quality of intelligence provided to national leaders and their effects on decision-making. One clear case is Obama’s insistence that terrorism of the sort practiced by Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda be called “violent extremism,” with no mention made of possible connections to Islam. This preference is now embedded in U.S. intelligence culture, biasing terrorism-related analyses. Surely there are other examples, but they are difficult to identify. Indeed, when such views are seen as worthy, they are perceived as truth, not biases. Other Marxian ideological biases damaged Soviet intelligence analysis for decades.
In his second term, President Trump has attacked what he calls the “weaponization” of intelligence against him by the “Deep State,” including by revoking Obama- and Biden-era executive orders and investigating persons such as Brennan. But his intelligence agency heads have not yet made significant efforts to change agencies’ organizational cultures. The Deep State is fighting back, duplicitously claiming that Trump is politicizing intelligence, thereby employing the time-honored intelligence operators’ technique of “projection” by claiming others are doing one’s own actions. Trump has not clarified whether he wants to restore the old ethic of apolitical public service or seek retribution against political enemies, aiding his critics. This conflict merits close monitoring.
This history has three major lessons for Europe. First, beware of injecting ideology into agencies’ organizational cultures because it generates analytical biases and flawed intelligence. DEI has often been pushed deceptively. It is important to recognize the divisive nature—and intent—of this agenda. Second, short of a major purge, it is difficult to remove such biases once established. Hence, prevention is the best policy. Third, intelligence services should monitor the information they receive from intelligence partners for ideology-based biases. Even close allies maintain their own perspectives on some issues, which now are more important than ever.
John A. Gentry
Adjunct Professor
Institute of World Politics and the School of Defense and Strategic Studies
Missouri State University
USA
