A CIA analyst who quit the agency after 11 years said Tuesday that he objected to White House strategist Steve Bannon sitting on the National Security Council and that he left because "the situation room in this administration may not have room for dissenting voices."
"Voices who are going to call them like they see them," Edward Price told Wolf Blitzer on CNN. "That is exactly the role of the CIA director and the director of national intelligence.
"You can have all of the inputs you want and voices can be incorporated in parts of the policy process, but it's the output that really matters.
"What we've seen during the course of the four weeks or so that the Trump administration has been in office is that the inputs are given short shrift and the outputs are manufactured almost exclusively by a small group of advisors around the president, very few of whom — in my opinion — have foreign policy and national security credentials."
Price, who joined the CIA in 2006, quit the intelligence agency last week. He disclosed in an op-ed in The Washington Post on Monday that "I cannot in good faith serve this administration as an intelligence professional."
He cited President Donald Trump's disparaging remarks about the intelligence community during the presidential campaign — as well as a directive last month from the president that omitted the CIA director and the director of national intelligence to the council, while including Bannon, "who cut his teeth as a media champion of white nationalism."
Trump has since amended the directive to include CIA Director Mike Pompeo, as well as the positions of DNI and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Price, who worked under former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, told Blitzer said that his move was "a uniquely personal decision" and that was "really unprecedented" that Bannon would sit on the council while the others initially would not.
"I can certainly speak to the case during the Obama administration — and those individuals whom I would consider political very rarely sat in on the National Security Council," Price said. "And when they did so, they weren't sitting at the table.
"They didn't have a vote."
Price donated $2,700 to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and $2,300 to the Democratic National Committee, Blitzer said.
He defended the contributions as being made to "candidates who I thought shared my values," noting that "I worked proudly for President George W. Bush.
"He was commander-in-chief," Price said. "I didn't necessarily agree with, but I respected the way he kept our country safe."