Robin Townley

One of Michael Flynn’s closest deputies on the NSC, senior director for Africa Robin Townley, was informed in February 2017 that the Central Intelligence Agency had rejected his request for an elite security clearance required for service on the NSC, according to two people with direct knowledge of the situation. That forced Townley, a former Marine intelligence officer who had long maintained a top secret-level security clearance, out of his NSC post, explained the sources, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters. One of the sources said the rejection was approved by Mike Pompeo, then President Donald Trump’s CIA director, and that it infuriated Flynn and his allies.