War With North Korea? Sen. Lindsey Graham Is Worred About Donald Trump's White House

In a critique of President-elect Donald Trump’s handling of a U.S. intelligence investigation into foreign hacking of the Nov. 8 election, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) told intelligence officials Thursday he was concerned the soon-to-be commander-in-chief wouldn’t trust them in the event of a nuclear threat from North Korea.

“I want to let the president-elect know that it’s okay to challenge the intel. You’re absolutely right to want to do so,” Graham said to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers at a Senate hearing. “But what I don’t want you to do is undermine those who are serving our nation in this arena until you’re absolutely sure they need to be undermined, and I think they need to be uplifted, not undermined.”

After referencing Trump’s slew of tweets disparaging the U.S. intelligence community for its allegations that the Russian government deliberately meddled in the American presidential election, Graham named North Korea’s nuclear missile threat as an example in which such unprecedented dismissal of intelligence could put U.S. security at risk.

“North Korea—let me give you an example of real world stuff he’s going to have to deal with,” Graham said, asking Rogers and Clapper whether he believed the east Asian nation is in the process of developing an intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, to which Rogers answered in the affirmative.

“So when the… North Korean leader says that they’re close to getting an ICBM, he’s probably in the realm of truth?” Graham asked.

“He’s certainly working aggressively to do that,” Rogers said, in reference to North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un.

“And if the president of the United States says it won’t happen, he’s going to come to you all to figure out how far along they are, because you’d be his source for how far along they are, is that right?” Graham asked.

“I’d hope we’d be the source,” Rogers and Clapper both said, to laughs in the Senate chamber.

“I’d hope he would talk to you too,” Graham said. “And here’s what I hope he realizes: that if he has to take action against North Korea, which he may have to do, I intend to support him, but he needs to explain to the American people why. And one of the explanations he’ll give is the one I was told by the people who are in the fight.”