MICHAEL ELLIS
General Counsel
2021-2021
IN A LAST-MINUTE MOVE, NSA INSTALLING TRUMP LOYALIST AS GENERAL COUNSEL
January 17, 2021
Susan Hennessey, a former NSA attorney and CNN legal and national security analyst, ripped the decision to install Ellis in the Trump administration's last weekend in power. "At this point, no one should extend this selection process the benefit of the doubt. By all indication, the Trump admin is violating civil service rules and politicizing an apolitical role. If Ellis is installed tonight, Biden should remove him on Day One," she wrote on Twitter.
WHY THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S MICHAEL ELLIS GAMBIT IS PROBLEMATIC
January 19, 2021
Ellis is notably a former aide to Rep. Devin Nunes (Calif.), the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee. Back in 2017, The Post, the New York Times and others reported that while serving in the White House, Ellis helped share intelligence with Nunes, who was then the committee’s chair, which showed Trump and his allies were swept up in foreign surveillance.
Nunes and the White House then used this information in an attempt to undermine the Russia investigation and to lend credence to Trump’s allegation that he and his team were spied on. This was despite them not being the targets of the surveillance. (Foreign actors are routinely surveilled, and those who speak with them can be swept up in what is known as “incidental” collection.)
LAST-MINUTE TRUMP APPOINTEE AT NSA PUT ON ADMINISTRATIVE LEAVE DUE TO INSPECTOR GENERAL PROBE
January 20, 2021
Before joining the Trump administration, Ellis served as the head counsel to California Rep. Devin Nunes, a Republican who is one of Trump's staunchest supporters.
Ellis then became a lawyer with the National Security Council, refusing to testify as part of the House's 2019 impeachment inquiry. In March 2020, Ellis became the senior director for intelligence on the NSC, joining other Trump loyalists in key intelligence positions.
NSA OFFICIAL INSTALLED AS TRUMP LEFT OFFICE RESIGNS AFTER HE WAS SIDELINED
April 17, 2021
Critics pointed to Ellis’s lack of experience in running a large legal team and noted he had graduated from Yale Law School only a decade earlier. He had been selected over two other finalists, both of whom had more experience as intelligence agency lawyers. One was the acting NSA general counsel; the other was acting general counsel at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
Ellis joined the Trump White House in early 2017, becoming a lawyer on the National Security Council. Before that, he was chief counsel to Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), a staunch Trump supporter who at the time was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
WHY MICHAEL ELLIS' NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY RESIGNATION MATTERS
April 19, 2021
Michael Ellis may not have a household name, but as regular readers know, his journey to the NSA was striking.
In 2017, Ellis' name first started appearing in national reports when he was accused of using his position in the White House counsel's office to feed sensitive information to then-House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.).
Two years later, Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman testified under oath that Ellis, a former Republican operative, was one of the officials responsible for transferring the infamous Trump/Zelensky call summary to the National Security Council's top-secret computer server.