The Danish foreign minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, said on Wednesday that he was concerned about the report in the Wall Street Journal, telling the Ritzau news agency: “It worries me a lot, because we don’t spy between friends.”
High-ranking officials working under Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, issued the instruction to agency heads in a “collection emphasis message”, the Journal reported.
Gabbard issued a statement saying the newspaper “should be ashamed of aiding deep state actors who seek to undermine the president by politicizing and leaking classified information”.