“Former” CIA agent John Kiriakou, while being interviewed by Mehdi Hasan, withdraws his previous endorsement of James Fishback. He initially claims he never endorsed him, then claims his assistant made the tweet containing his endorsement of him and that he “tore him a new one for it”, then when confronted over the fact he endorsed him in a live interview says “it was a stupid thing to say”.
Kiriakou then proceeds to say Fishback’s remarks about blacks and Indians are “dreadful” and that a line needs to be drawn between people who are merely critical of Israel and those who are “racist and antisemitic” and that those who are should not be allied with.
Kiriakou has previously stated that he “does not believe there’s any kind of behind the scenes subterfuge” regarding Joe Kent’s resignation over the Iran War. Kiriakou’s evidence for this belief comes from a group he belongs to called the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) that is made up of retired FBI, CIA, NSA, and DOJ agents. Kiriakou says VIPS awarded Kent with the “Sam Adam’s Award for Integrity in Intelligence” for his opposition to the Iran War and that “we believe what we’re seeing is what we’re getting” with regards to Kent and that his resignation was purely motivated by his concerns with Israel’s influence in dragging the US into the conflict with false intelligence.
Kiriakou has also previously spread conspiracy theories about Israel’s involvement in Charlie Kirk’s assassination. He added after the discussion regarding them potentially taking out Kirk: “which is why I worry about Tucker”. Kiriakou has also been interviewed multiple times by Tucker Carlson, who also often makes a distinction between simple critics of Israel and “real anti-semites” like Nick Fuentes.