Gail Helt
| Gail Helt | |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Intelligence officer, university professor |
Gail Helt, who became director of the Security and Intelligence Studies Program at King University in Tennessee in 2014, was previously an analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency.[1]
In 2018 Helt triggered press commentary through her criticism of her former colleague, Gina Haspel, a central figure in the CIA torture program, after President Donald Trump picked her as his choice to head the CIA.[2][3] Spencer Ackerman, writing in the Daily Beast, quoted Helt stating she had been told, as late as 2013, that some of the controversial recordings of Abu Zubaydah's torture had not been destroyed in 2005, as the CIA had maintained following their acknowledgement of making the recordings in 2008.
In 2015 Helt publicly opposed the decision of Bill Haslam, Governor of Tennessee, to bar Syrian refugees from trying to settle in Tennessee.[4] Helt argued that vetting the backgrounds of refugees was sufficient to protect Tennesse from jihadist sleeper agents.
On December 21, 2018 Helt confirmed that she owned a painting made by former Guantanamo captive Abdul Malik Wahab al Rahabi.[5] She said the painting reminds her of our common humanity.
On January 8, 2019, Carol Rosenberg wrote about a report that Haspel had been assigned to one of the CIA black sites at Guantanamo.[6] She quoted Helt who said there had been “a lot of shadiness” in the CIA's narrative about Haspel's career, and that she would find it "unsurprising" to learn Haspel had been in charge at Guantanamo.
Following outgoing President Donald Trump's attempts to disrupt the smooth transfer of power to his democratically elected successor, Joe Biden, the Washington Post quoted Helt stating his remind intelligence officials of similar attempts by dictators in failed states.[7]
Education
| BS | University of Nebraska at Kearney | |
| MA | Iowa State University | |
| PhD | University of Arizona | incomplete. Helt was working on her PhD in 2003, when she joined the CIA |
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 The Director. King University. Retrieved on 2018-05-01. “Her research interests include democratization, the decline of US influence around the world, and Asian politics. She has a MA in Political Science from Iowa State University, and completed 30 hours of PhD coursework at the University of Arizona before being recruited by the CIA.”
- ↑ Spencer Ackerman. Ex-CIA Official Says Some Torture Videotapes May Still Exist, Daily Beast, 2018-05-01. Retrieved on 2018-05-01. “But the now-retired analyst, Gail Helt, said she memorialized their conversation in a notebook she kept at the time, a copy of which The Daily Beast has seen. Haspel’s nomination has compelled her to disclose what she heard, Helt said.”
- ↑ Nafeesa Syeed. The CIA Is Getting a Private-Sector Makeover, Bloomberg Businessweek, 2018-04-19. Retrieved on 2018-05-01. “Ultimately, efficiency might not be the best match for intelligence work. There are built-in checks—whether in producing an analytical report or collecting information—that purposely slow down the process. “There are some places where efficiency should not be the goal,” Gail Helt, a former CIA analyst who is now professor and director of the Security and Intelligence Studies program at King University in Bristol, Tenn. “There needs to be some higher level of accountability than just the chief of station or a case officer who is charged with getting information. That is an incredibly risky proposition,” removing layers of oversight.”
- ↑ Tiana Bohner. Reaction to Gov. Haslam's statement against Syrian refugees entering Tenn., WCYB TV, 2015-11-16. Retrieved on 2018-05-01. “Millions of people are considered refugees in their own country of Syria. After seeing this, a professor at King University has been raising funds to send overseas. Gail Helt also worked for the CIA for more than decade before joining King.”
- ↑ Carol Rosenberg. Did Pentagon ban on Guantánamo art create a market for it? See who owns prison art., McClatchy News Service, 2018-12-21. Retrieved on 2019-10-11. “'I find it inspiring that people in the worst moments of their lives, the darkest days, could still remember the beauty in this world and depict it in some way,' said Gail Helt, a former CIA analyst who recently purchased a piece of art from freed Yemeni detainee Abdul Malik Wahab al Rahabi.”
- ↑ Carol Rosenberg. Did CIA Director Gina Haspel run a black site at Guantánamo?, McClatchy News Service, 2019-01-08. Retrieved on 2019-10-11. “An official CIA timeline of Haspel’s 33-year career notes that the agency won’t disclose 30 short-term, temporary duty assignments she held over the course of her career, suggesting they were covert. “Was one of those at Guantánamo for a couple of months?,” said Helt. “I don’t have personal knowledge of that, and couldn’t discuss it if I did. But it doesn’t surprise me.””
- ↑ Greg Miller. CIA veterans who monitored crackdowns abroad see troubling parallels in Trump’s handling of protests, Washington Post, 2020-06-02. Retrieved on 2020-06-03. “'I’ve seen this kind of violence,' said Gail Helt, a former CIA analyst responsible for tracking developments in China and Southeast Asia. 'This is what autocrats do. This is what happens in countries before a collapse. It really does unnerve me.'”
- ↑ Staff and Faculty. King University. Retrieved on 2018-05-01.