Fact-checked by Grok 2 weeks ago

Deep state

The deep state, originating from the Turkish phrase derin devlet, denotes a clandestine network embedded within the state apparatus—encompassing military officers, intelligence operatives, security personnel, and affiliated criminal elements—that wields extralegal influence over national policy, often subverting elected governments through coups, assassinations, and propaganda.^[1]^[2] In this original context, it manifested in Turkey's post-Ottoman era as ultra-nationalist factions enforcing Kemalist secularism and territorial integrity against perceived Islamist or separatist threats, with documented involvement in events like the 1980 military coup and extrajudicial killings.^[3]^[4] Adapted to the United States, the term describes an entrenched coalition of federal bureaucracies, intelligence agencies, defense contractors, and financial elites that operates with substantial independence from democratic oversight, perpetuating policy continuity via administrative expertise, regulatory capture, and interlocking personnel ties across public and private sectors.^[5]^[6] Popularized by Mike Lofgren, a veteran congressional analyst, in his 2014 essay and 2016 book, this American variant emphasizes a "fourth branch" of government—beyond the constitutional three—where career officials, lobbyists, and Silicon Valley actors shape outcomes like endless wars, surveillance expansion, and economic deregulation through bipartisan mechanisms such as revolving doors and classified operations.^[7]^[8] Unlike the overtly violent Turkish model, the U.S. iteration relies on legalistic insulation, as seen in the post-World War II growth of the national security state, which has resisted presidential directives on issues from foreign interventions to domestic intelligence abuses.^[9] The concept's prominence surged during Donald Trump's presidency (2017–2021), when allegations surfaced of systematic obstruction by intelligence holdovers and civil servants, including unauthorized leaks, the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane investigation into Trump-Russia ties, and declassification disputes revealing prior administrations' surveillance practices.^[10] Proponents cite these as indicators of causal persistence in unelected institutions prioritizing globalist or interventionist agendas over voter mandates, while detractors frame it as unfounded paranoia amid routine bureaucratic friction.^[11] Empirical markers include the intelligence community's 2017 assessment on Russian election interference—later critiqued for procedural irregularities—and the revolving door's scale, with over 400 former senior officials transitioning to defense lobbying roles since 2000, underscoring influence networks that transcend administrations.^[12]^[13] This duality—real structural autonomy versus hyperbolic conspiracy—defines ongoing debates over accountability in modern governance.

Conceptual Foundations

Definition and Core Elements

The deep state refers to entrenched networks within government institutions, comprising career bureaucrats, intelligence officials, and affiliated private-sector entities in finance and defense industries, that exercise significant influence over policy and operations independently of elected leadership and without requiring explicit public consent through democratic processes. This concept emphasizes a "permanent government" that persists across electoral cycles, prioritizing institutional continuity and self-preservation over transient political directives. Unlike portrayals of a monolithic conspiracy, proponents describe it as a visible, systemic fusion of public authority and elite private interests, operating through legal mechanisms, revolving personnel, and resource allocation rather than covert plots.^[5] Central components include the national security bureaucracy, encompassing agencies such as the Department of Defense, Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Homeland Security, and elements of the Justice Department and Treasury, which coordinate via bodies like the National Security Council and wield tools including surveillance and classified decision-making.^[5] The intelligence community's autonomy is highlighted by its capacity for independent operations, as evidenced by programs like the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) courts, which handle secret warrants with limited oversight.^[5] Another core element is the military-industrial complex, a term introduced by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in his January 17, 1961, farewell address, warning of the potential for unwarranted influence by an alliance of military leaders and defense contractors on American governance, given the complex's vast procurement budgets exceeding $800 billion annually in recent fiscal years. Interlinked with this are financial networks, particularly Wall Street firms, which provide funding and expertise through a revolving door of personnel—such as former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner moving from government to private finance—enabling policy alignment with corporate priorities over electoral mandates.^[5] These elements collectively sustain a feedback loop of power, where bureaucratic inertia and private incentives resist reforms, as seen in prolonged engagements like the post-2001 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan despite shifting administrations.^[5]

Etymology and Linguistic Origins

The term "deep state" is a direct calque, or loan translation, of the Turkish phrase derin devlet, literally meaning "deep state," which emerged in Turkish political discourse during the 1990s.^[14] In its original context, derin devlet referred to purported clandestine alliances among military officers, intelligence operatives, judges, and criminal elements that functioned parallel to, and sometimes in opposition to, Turkey's elected civilian government, often invoked to explain extrajudicial actions against perceived threats such as the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) insurgency.^[1]^[11] The English term entered academic usage in the 1990s through translations and analyses of Turkish politics, with early instances appearing in scholarly works borrowing the concept to describe entrenched, unelected networks wielding influence beyond formal democratic oversight.^[15] One of the earliest documented English applications traces to journalist Robert D. Kaplan's writings on regional authoritarianism, where it retained its Turkish connotation of shadowy, autonomous power structures.^[16] Linguistically, "deep state" lacks pre-1990s antecedents in English etymology, distinguishing it from broader historical notions of permanent bureaucracies or shadow governance, which were articulated through terms like "state within a state" but without the specific "deep" modifier implying concealed depth.^[14] By the early 2000s, sporadic uses in theses and reports on Turkish affairs solidified the translation, but widespread adoption in English-language media and politics occurred later, adapting the term to non-Turkish contexts without altering its core linguistic roots.^[16] The phrase's persistence reflects its utility in encapsulating causal dynamics of institutional entrenchment, where formal linguistic borrowing preserved the Turkish emphasis on hidden, self-perpetuating layers of authority.^[17]

Historical Precursors and Early Analogues

In ancient Rome, the Praetorian Guard exemplified an early analogue to entrenched, unelected power structures, initially formed by Emperor Augustus in 27 BC as a select cohort of nine units totaling around 4,500 men to serve as his personal bodyguard and enforce loyalty among the legions. Over time, this elite force accrued independent political leverage, including the ability to acclaim or assassinate emperors, as seen in their murder of Caligula on January 24, 41 AD, followed by the immediate elevation of Claudius to the throne through bribery and coercion.^[18] ^[19] Their influence culminated in the assassination of Pertinax on March 28, 193 AD, after just 87 days in power, prompting the Guard to publicly auction the imperial title to Didius Julianus for 25,000 sesterces per soldier, an act that underscored their capacity to commodify sovereignty and destabilize succession.^[19] ^[20] This unchecked autonomy, funded by imperial stipends far exceeding those of regular troops—up to 3,000 denarii annually by the 2nd century AD—enabled the Guard to prioritize self-interest over state stability, contributing to the Year of the Five Emperors and prompting Emperor Constantine's disbandment of the unit in 312 AD following the Battle of Milvian Bridge.^[20] ^[21] Parallel dynamics emerged in imperial China, where castrated eunuchs, barred from founding dynasties due to infertility, infiltrated the palace as servants but frequently amassed de facto control over court politics, military commands, and fiscal policy through proximity to the emperor and factional alliances. During the Eastern Han Dynasty (25–220 AD), eunuch consortia dominated advisory roles, orchestrating purges of Confucian officials and amassing wealth equivalent to state revenues; by 166 AD, figures like Cao Jie commanded networks that suppressed dissent, exacerbating corruption and peasant revolts that precipitated the dynasty's collapse in 220 AD.^[22] In the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644 AD), eunuchs under Emperor Zhengde (r. 1505–1521) formed the "Eight Tigers" clique, which monopolized the Brocade Guard secret police, directed naval expeditions, and influenced appointments, diverting resources for personal aggrandizement and undermining bureaucratic checks until Zhengde's death amid scandals.^[23] Eunuch power peaked in scale during the Tang Dynasty (618–907 AD), when they oversaw the imperial treasury and secretariat, with numbers swelling to thousands; their interventions, such as the 820 AD coup by eunuchs against Emperor Xianzong's ministers, illustrated a recurring pattern of shadow influence that eroded merit-based governance and fueled dynastic cycles of rise and fall. The Byzantine Empire (330–1453 AD) offered another precursor through its centralized bureaucracy, a meritocratic yet hierarchical apparatus of logothetes and sakellarioi that preserved administrative continuity amid frequent imperial turnover, often constraining or outlasting rulers via codified procedures inherited from Roman traditions. This system, comprising over 100 distinct offices by the 9th century under the Theme System, enabled officials to manipulate tax collection—yielding annual revenues of approximately 3–4 million nomismata—and diplomatic intrigues independently of the emperor's whims, as evidenced by the 11th-century bureaucratic resistance to Norman invasions under emperors like Romanos IV.^[24] Scholarly analyses trace its origins to Diocletian's reforms around 284 AD, evolving into Europe's first proto-modern state machinery where civil servants, insulated by tenure and expertise, wielded de facto veto power over policy, contributing to the empire's longevity but also to inefficiencies like the excessive layering of approvals that contemporaries critiqued in texts such as the De Administrando Imperio (c. 950 AD).^[25] These structures, while adaptive for managing a multi-ethnic domain spanning three continents, periodically devolved into factional cabals, mirroring later deep state concerns by prioritizing institutional self-preservation over elected or appointed leadership.^[24]

Theoretical Frameworks

Bureaucratic Entrenchment and Permanent Government

The theory of bureaucratic entrenchment posits that modern administrative states foster self-perpetuating institutions where unelected officials accrue autonomy through legal safeguards, procedural expertise, and resource control, often insulating them from direct electoral accountability. In the United States, this dynamic emerged prominently with the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act of 1883, which shifted federal hiring from political patronage to merit-based systems, embedding career protections that prioritized tenure and expertise over responsiveness to transient political leadership. By design, these reforms aimed to curb corruption but inadvertently created layers of insulated decision-making, as civil servants—numbering approximately 2.1 million in the executive branch as of recent data—outnumber political appointees (around 4,000) by orders of magnitude, enabling continuity in policy implementation despite electoral shifts.^[26]^[27] The "permanent government" framework, as articulated by political scientist Hugh Heclo, describes this cadre of career bureaucrats as a "government of strangers" to incoming administrations, where inherited institutional knowledge and networks facilitate inertia against reforms. Heclo argued that presidents encounter resistance not from overt conspiracy but from the sheer momentum of entrenched routines, regulatory precedents, and inter-agency alliances, which prioritize organizational survival over adaptive governance. This permanence is evidenced by the relative stability of federal civilian employment since the 1960s—hovering near 2 million despite population growth of over 68%—while the explosion in contractors and grantees (adding millions more to the effective workforce) further diffuses accountability, as these external actors operate under less scrutiny than direct employees.^[28]^[29]^[30] Mechanisms of entrenchment include the delegation of rulemaking authority to agencies under statutes like the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946, which empowers bureaucrats to interpret and expand legislative intent through regulations—often numbering in the tens of thousands annually—bypassing congressional oversight. Critics, drawing from public choice theory, contend this fosters regulatory capture, where agencies align with interest groups or internal ideologies, resisting deregulation efforts; for instance, Republican administrations since the 1980s have sought to curb bureaucratic expansion but faced pushback from careerists embedded in departments like Justice and State. Such dynamics underscore causal realism in governance: unelected actors, incentivized by job security and mission creep, can perpetuate policies misaligned with voter mandates, as seen in persistent growth of federal rules from about 70,000 pages in the 1970s to over 180,000 by 2020, despite rhetorical commitments to streamlining.^[31]^[32] Empirical indicators of permanence include low turnover rates among senior executives—protected by the Senior Executive Service established in 1978—and the delegation of foreign policy "blob" continuity, where career diplomats and analysts sustain interventionist postures across ideologically divergent presidencies. While proponents of neutral competence defend this as essential for expertise-driven stability, detractors highlight risks of unaccountable power concentration, noting that bureaucratic resistance, such as leaks or delayed implementations during policy pivots, erodes democratic control without violating formal procedures. This theoretical tension reveals the administrative state's dual role: a bulwark against whimsy, yet a potential veto on electoral change, rooted in the causal interplay of institutional design and human incentives favoring stasis.^[33]^[34]

Intelligence Community Autonomy and Shadow Influence

The establishment of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) under the National Security Act of 1947 granted the agency broad authority for covert operations and intelligence coordination, often with limited congressional oversight, enabling significant operational autonomy in foreign policy matters.^[35] This framework allowed the intelligence community (IC) to conduct activities such as regime change efforts and paramilitary support without immediate elected accountability, as evidenced by early Cold War operations.^[36] The 1975 Church Committee investigation revealed extensive IC abuses, including the CIA's MKUltra mind-control experiments from 1953 to 1973, unauthorized domestic surveillance by the FBI's COINTELPRO program targeting civil rights leaders between 1956 and 1971, and assassination plots against foreign leaders like Fidel Castro in the early 1960s, all conducted with minimal oversight from the executive or legislative branches.^[37] These findings demonstrated how agencies like the CIA and FBI operated with de facto independence, influencing domestic and foreign events through clandestine means while evading constitutional checks, prompting reforms like the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to impose warrants for national security surveillance.^[38] In the 1980s Iran-Contra affair, National Security Council staff and CIA elements facilitated arms sales to Iran—despite an embargo—and diverted proceeds to Nicaraguan Contras in defiance of the Boland Amendments (1982–1984), which prohibited such U.S. aid, illustrating shadow influence through off-the-books networks that bypassed congressional prohibitions and presidential directives.^[39] Independent counsel Lawrence Walsh's 1993 report concluded that these actions stemmed from a deliberate effort to sustain covert funding streams autonomous from statutory limits, affecting U.S. policy in Central America without public or legislative consent.^[40] Edward Snowden's 2013 disclosures exposed the National Security Agency's (NSA) bulk collection of Americans' metadata under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, conducted via partnerships with telecommunications firms without individualized warrants, highlighting persistent autonomy in mass surveillance programs that influenced counterterrorism policy while operating beyond routine oversight.^[41] The revelations, involving programs like PRISM initiated post-9/11, showed the IC's capacity for systemic data acquisition that shaped executive decisions on global threats, with internal NSA documents indicating operations prioritized collection volume over targeted legality.^[42] Subsequent reforms, such as the USA Freedom Act of 2015, curtailed some bulk collection but underscored ongoing tensions between IC operational independence and democratic accountability.^[43] These episodes collectively illustrate the IC's structural autonomy—rooted in classified mandates and compartmentalization—enabling shadow influence on policy through covert actions, intelligence assessments that precondition decisions, and resistance to external controls, as critiqued in reform studies for fostering unaccountable power centers.^[36]^[44] Despite oversight mechanisms like the Intelligence Committees established post-Church, declassified records indicate recurring patterns where urgency of threats justified extralegal maneuvers, impacting U.S. foreign engagements from Latin America to the Middle East.^[45]

Contractor and Financial Networks as Unelected Power Centers

The U.S. intelligence community has increasingly relied on private contractors to perform core functions, with contractors comprising a significant portion of the workforce as of 2015, including roles in analysis, operations, and technical support across agencies like the CIA and NSA.^[46] This outsourcing expanded post-9/11, enabling rapid scaling but creating parallel structures where private firms hold access to classified information and decision-making processes without direct electoral accountability.^[47] For instance, Booz Allen Hamilton, a leading contractor, derives over 98% of its revenue from government contracts and employs thousands in intelligence roles, including Edward Snowden, who accessed NSA systems as a contractor in 2013.^[48] ^[49] This contractor ecosystem exerts influence through the revolving door, where former government officials join firms that then bid on contracts they once oversaw. A 2023 Senate report found that among 700 senior Department of Defense officials who left for industry between 2009 and 2021, 91% became registered lobbyists for defense contractors, shaping procurement and policy to favor incumbents.^[50] Similarly, up to 80% of retiring three- and four-star generals have taken defense industry roles, embedding military priorities into corporate strategies that lobby for sustained high budgets, as seen in the Pentagon's $858 billion allocation for fiscal year 2023.^[51] ^[52] Such dynamics prioritize contractor profits over efficiency, with firms like Booz Allen securing multi-billion-dollar deals, such as a $5.6 billion Defense Intelligence Agency contract in 2013, blurring public oversight.^[49] ^[53] Financial networks operate as parallel power centers via entrenched ties between Wall Street and regulatory bodies, exemplified by the revolving door at the Treasury Department. Former Goldman Sachs executives have held key positions, including Treasury Secretaries Henry Paulson (2006–2009) and Steven Mnuchin (2017–2021), facilitating policies like the 2008 bailouts that preserved bank solvency amid $700 billion in TARP funds.^[54] ^[55] This pattern extends to regulators, where 29 documented transitions from Wall Street to senior government roles by 2011 influenced deregulation, contributing to systemic risks exposed in the financial crisis.^[55] These networks amplify unelected sway through lobbying and expertise capture, with defense and financial sectors spending $138 million and $5.2 billion on lobbying in 2022, respectively, often to entrench status quo policies against reform efforts.^[56] While proponents argue contractors provide specialized agility unavailable in-house, critics note the resultant opacity and profit incentives distort national priorities, as evidenced by intelligence contractor over-reliance hindering accountability post-Snowden revelations. In finance, regulatory capture—where industry veterans shape rules favoring incumbents—has been linked to lenient enforcement, such as delayed Dodd-Frank implementations under appointees with bank ties.^[54] Empirical data from revolving door trackers underscore how these cycles sustain influence independent of electoral cycles, forming de facto veto points on policy.^[57]

Empirical Manifestations

United States

In the United States, empirical manifestations of deep state dynamics center on the permanent federal bureaucracy and semi-autonomous intelligence agencies that exercise significant influence over policy implementation and national security, often independent of direct electoral accountability. This structure emerged from civil service reforms insulating officials from patronage and expanded through national security legislation granting operational leeway to unelected entities. Former congressional staffer Mike Lofgren described the deep state in 2016 as a "hybrid association of elements of government and parts of top-level finance and industry that is effectively able to govern... without reference to the consent of the governed as expressed through the formal political process."^[7]

Pre-20th Century Roots

The foundations of bureaucratic entrenchment predate the 20th century, rooted in the transition from political patronage to a merit-based civil service system. Under the spoils system popularized by President Andrew Jackson following his 1828 election, federal positions were awarded as rewards for political loyalty, with approximately 50,000 post offices and other roles subject to rotation upon administration changes.^[58] This system, justified as democratizing access but prone to inefficiency and corruption, persisted until the assassination of President James A. Garfield on July 2, 1881, by Charles Guiteau, a rejected office seeker, which galvanized public demand for reform.^[59] The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, signed January 16, 1883, by President Chester A. Arthur, established the United States Civil Service Commission to oversee competitive examinations for merit-based appointments, initially covering roughly 10% of federal jobs but expanding to over 90% by the mid-20th century.^[59] This legislation reduced presidential removal powers and created a cadre of career civil servants protected from partisan purges, fostering a "permanent government" that outlasted elected officials. By the 1890s, regulatory bodies like the Interstate Commerce Commission, established in 1887, exemplified this growing administrative state, wielding quasi-legislative authority over economic sectors with minimal direct congressional oversight.^[58] These reforms, while curbing overt corruption, embedded unelected expertise in policy execution, setting precedents for institutional inertia resistant to political directives.

Cold War and Post-9/11 Developments

The Cold War era institutionalized intelligence autonomy through the National Security Act of 1947, signed July 26 by President Harry S. Truman, which unified the armed services under a Secretary of Defense, created the National Security Council, and established the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) as an independent agency tasked with coordinating foreign intelligence and conducting covert actions.^[35] The CIA, evolving from the wartime Office of Strategic Services, was granted authority for operations "otherwise prohibited by United States law," enabling activities like the 1953 overthrow of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh without routine congressional notification, as later declassified documents revealed.^[60] This framework expanded the intelligence community's operational independence, with the CIA's budget and personnel growing significantly amid anti-communist efforts, including domestic surveillance programs like COINTELPRO run by the FBI from 1956 to 1971.^[61] Post-9/11 developments accelerated this entrenchment via legislative expansions. The USA PATRIOT Act, enacted October 26, 2001, broadened surveillance under Section 215 for "tangible things" relevant to terrorism investigations, while the Homeland Security Act of 2002 created the Department of Homeland Security, consolidating 22 agencies. The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 established the Director of National Intelligence to oversee 17 agencies, with the overall intelligence budget reaching $87.7 billion in fiscal year 2023.^[62] The attacks prompted a surge in contractors, with private firms performing up to 70% of intelligence work by 2010, forming unelected networks intertwined with government functions and shielded by classification.^[10] These changes, justified by security imperatives, resulted in an opaque apparatus where accountability mechanisms, such as congressional oversight, often lagged behind operational secrecy.

Trump Era Investigations and Resistances

The Trump administration (2017-2021) highlighted tensions between elected leadership and entrenched elements through documented instances of internal resistance, leaks, and investigative overreach. A wave of unauthorized disclosures began early, including the January 2017 leak of Michael Flynn's calls with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, leading to his resignation as National Security Advisor, which media reports attributed to career officials bypassing chain of command.^[63] The FBI's Crossfire Hurricane probe, launched July 31, 2016, into Trump campaign-Russia ties, relied on FISA warrants for Carter Page that the Department of Justice Inspector General's December 2019 report identified 17 significant inaccuracies or omissions, including withheld exculpatory information and reliance on the unverified Steele dossier.^[64] Further resistance materialized in public acts, such as the September 5, 2018, anonymous New York Times op-ed by a "senior official" claiming collective efforts within the administration to thwart Trump's agenda, later revealed in 2020 as written by Miles Taylor, a Department of Homeland Security chief of staff.^[32] Special Counsel John Durham's 2023 report criticized the FBI for launching the Russia investigation on "raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence" without predicate of conspiracy, recommending reforms to prevent political misuse of counterintelligence tools. These episodes, corroborated by declassified memos and official reviews, illustrated how intelligence and bureaucratic actors could leverage institutional tools to challenge an administration's directives, fueling debates over accountability in unelected power centers.^[64]

Pre-20th Century Roots

The initial federal bureaucracy emerged in 1789 when the First Congress created the Departments of Foreign Affairs (renamed State in 1790), Treasury, and War, along with the office of Attorney General, to execute executive functions under President George Washington.^[58] Alexander Hamilton, appointed the first Secretary of the Treasury in September 1789, rapidly expanded its administrative apparatus, establishing customs districts, revenue cutters, and internal tax collectors to enforce tariffs and excises, employing over 1,000 officials by the early 1790s whose roles involved discretionary enforcement that influenced local economies and politics.^[65] These structures demonstrated early potential for unelected influence, as Hamilton's network of subordinates collected intelligence and shaped fiscal policy, prompting Republican critics like Thomas Jefferson to view the Treasury as an autonomous power center resistant to full partisan overhaul upon his 1801 inauguration, despite attempts to replace key personnel.^[66] Throughout the 19th century, federal administrative roles proliferated amid territorial expansion, postal growth, and economic regulation, increasing civilian employees from fewer than 5,000 in 1820 to approximately 37,000 by 1861, primarily in agencies like the Post Office Department and General Land Office.^[67] The spoils system, intensified under President Andrew Jackson from 1829, systematically rotated appointments to reward supporters, ostensibly to curb inherited elitism from the Federalist era but fostering inefficiency and corruption as jobholders prioritized party service over expertise, with turnover rates exceeding 50% per administration in some departments.^[68] ^[69] This patronage entrenched informal networks of influence among long-serving intermediaries and contractors, who leveraged connections for policy sway, prefiguring later permanent bureaucracies despite the lack of job security. The assassination of President James A. Garfield on July 2, 1881, by Charles Guiteau, a mentally unstable spoils system beneficiary denied a consular post, catalyzed reform momentum, culminating in the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act signed January 16, 1883, which mandated competitive examinations for initial coverage of about 10-12% of federal positions, creating a merit-protected cadre insulated from electoral cycles.^[70] ^[71] By shielding appointees from routine dismissal, the Act fostered administrative continuity and expertise, transforming patronage holdovers into a foundational layer of unelected authority that expanded to over 80% of roles by the early 20th century, addressing prior chaos but enabling bureaucratic momentum independent of elected branches.^[72]

Cold War and Post-9/11 Developments

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was established on September 18, 1947, under the National Security Act, marking the formal institutionalization of a centralized intelligence apparatus amid escalating Cold War tensions with the Soviet Union.^[73] This entity inherited functions from the wartime Office of Strategic Services and rapidly expanded its covert operations, including propaganda, paramilitary actions, and regime change efforts, often with limited congressional oversight.^[74] During the 1950s and 1960s, the U.S. intelligence community grew in size and scope, with the CIA assuming primary responsibility for foreign espionage and counterintelligence, enabling autonomous decision-making on operations like the 1953 Iranian coup and the 1954 Guatemalan overthrow.^[75] CIA Director Allen Dulles in 1961 advocated for a "Special Group" with independent authority to approve covert actions, underscoring the agency's push for operational independence from elected branches.^[74] Programs such as MKUltra, authorized in 1953, exemplified intelligence autonomy through unauthorized domestic experiments on mind control using LSD and other methods, conducted without public or full interagency knowledge until declassified in the 1970s.^[76] This era's bureaucratic entrenchment fostered a "permanent government" dynamic, where career intelligence officials influenced foreign policy continuity across administrations, as critiqued in David Wise and Thomas Ross's 1964 book The Invisible Government, which detailed the CIA's unchecked influence on U.S. decisions.^[77] By the late Cold War, the intelligence community's 17-plus agencies operated with budgets exceeding oversight capacities, prioritizing anti-communist imperatives over democratic accountability.^[78] Following the September 11, 2001, attacks, the USA PATRIOT Act, enacted on October 26, 2001, dramatically expanded surveillance powers, allowing warrantless wiretaps and bulk data collection under relaxed Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act standards, effectively embedding intelligence priorities into domestic law enforcement.^[79] The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 created the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to coordinate 18 agencies, but this reform centralized oversight while preserving agency silos and contractor dependencies, with the National Intelligence Program budget surging from approximately $40 billion pre-9/11 to over $80 billion by 2013.^[80] ^[81] Post-9/11 developments amplified unelected influence through the Department of Homeland Security's formation in 2002 and enhanced NSA capabilities for global metadata collection, revealed in 2013 by Edward Snowden as exceeding legal bounds.^[82] These expansions, justified by counterterrorism needs, entrenched a surveillance state where intelligence contractors—numbering over 1,900 firms by 2010—handled sensitive operations, often resisting policy shifts from incoming administrations.^[83] Empirical data from leaked budgets indicate sustained growth, with military intelligence spending adding tens of billions annually, fostering parallel power structures insulated from electoral cycles.^[80]

Trump Era Investigations and Resistances

During Donald Trump's presidency from January 20, 2017, to January 20, 2021, allegations emerged of systematic resistance from unelected officials within federal agencies, particularly the FBI and DOJ, aimed at undermining his administration. Trump publicly described this as interference by a "deep state," citing leaks, investigations, and bureaucratic obstructions as evidence of institutional bias against his policies and agenda. These claims were supported by empirical findings of procedural irregularities in probes targeting his campaign and associates, though institutional defenders attributed actions to routine law enforcement rather than coordinated sabotage. The FBI initiated "Crossfire Hurricane," its counterintelligence investigation into potential Trump-Russia ties, on July 31, 2016, following a tip from Australian diplomats about campaign adviser George Papadopoulos's discussions with a Russian-linked professor. This probe relied heavily on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants to surveil Carter Page, a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, with applications renewed four times between October 2016 and September 2017. A December 2019 DOJ Inspector General report by Michael Horowitz documented 17 significant errors and omissions in these applications, including failures to disclose exculpatory information about Page's prior CIA cooperation and overreliance on the unverified Steele dossier, which was funded by the Clinton campaign. Horowitz concluded these inaccuracies undermined the FISA process's integrity but found no documentary evidence of intentional political bias, though he criticized FBI handling as reflecting "serious performance failures." Further scrutiny came via Special Counsel John Durham, appointed by Attorney General William Barr in May 2019 and elevated to special counsel in October 2020, to examine the Russia probe's origins. Durham's May 2023 report faulted the FBI for launching a full investigation prematurely without sufficient predicate, citing "confirmation bias" in ignoring intelligence indicating Clinton campaign efforts to link Trump to Russia as a distraction from her email scandal.^[84] It highlighted FBI failures to verify Steele dossier claims and noted that senior officials, including James Comey and Andrew McCabe, bypassed standard procedures. Durham secured three convictions—two for false statements and one for unauthorized disclosure—but criticized broader institutional lapses, stating the FBI applied a "lower threshold" for Trump-related inquiries than for Clinton matters.^[84] Trump responded by declassifying documents, including Russia probe footnotes and Brennan CIA notes in October 2020, revealing Obama-era briefings on Russian interference favoring Clinton, which fueled claims of politicized intelligence. Resistance manifested in documented leaks and internal dissent. Text messages between FBI counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok and lawyer Lisa Page, revealed in 2017-2018, included August 2016 exchanges expressing anti-Trump sentiment, such as Strzok's "We'll stop it," amid their roles in Crossfire Hurricane and early Mueller probe phases. The DOJ fired Strzok in August 2018 for violating policy, while Page resigned. A September 5, 2018, anonymous New York Times op-ed by a self-described senior Trump official claimed an internal "resistance" thwarting the president's "misguided impulses," prompting administration demands for identification and highlighting bureaucratic non-compliance.^[85] Such actions, alongside high-profile firings like Comey's on May 9, 2017, for mishandling probes, and McCabe's in March 2018 for unauthorized leaks, exemplified tensions between elected leadership and career officials. Despite these, Trump appointees like Barr pursued reforms, including FISA warrant reviews, though entrenched networks persisted in slowing executive directives on immigration and deregulation.

Turkey and Middle Eastern Origins

The concept of the derin devlet, or deep state, emerged in Turkey during the 1990s to describe entrenched, clandestine alliances among military officers, intelligence operatives, organized crime figures, and ultranationalist groups that operated parallel to formal government institutions to influence or override elected civilian authority, particularly to safeguard secular Kemalist principles against perceived Islamist threats.^[1]^[2] These networks trace their roots to the late Ottoman era, specifically the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), a secret society that orchestrated the 1908 Young Turk Revolution and employed covert violence, including assassinations and massacres, to consolidate power and modernize the empire along nationalist lines.^[86] This tradition persisted into the Turkish Republic founded in 1923, where the military positioned itself as the ultimate guardian of Atatürk's secular legacy, justifying interventions such as the 1960 coup that executed Prime Minister Adnan Menderes, the 1971 military memorandum forcing civilian resignation, the 1980 coup imposing martial law amid political violence, and the 1997 "postmodern coup" that pressured the Islamist Welfare Party government to step down.^[87] A pivotal exposure of these networks occurred in the 1996 Susurluk scandal, when a car crash on November 3 near the town of Susurluk killed a police chief, Hüseyin Kocadağ, and injured an ultranationalist hitman, Abdullah Çatlı—linked to the Grey Wolves militia and Turkish intelligence (MIT)—alongside a parliamentarian, Sedat Bucak; the incident revealed state-sanctioned "death squads" collaborating with mafia elements in extrajudicial operations, including drug trafficking and assassinations targeting Kurdish PKK militants during Turkey's southeastern insurgency.^[88]^[89] Subsequent investigations, such as the 2007 Ergenekon case, uncovered arms caches and documents implicating retired generals, journalists, and academics in plots for coups and bombings, leading to trials that convicted over 300 individuals in 2013 for terrorism and membership in a criminal organization aimed at destabilizing the AKP government; while some convictions were later overturned in 2016 amid allegations of Gülenist fabrication, the case highlighted verifiable deep state tactics like false-flag operations and media manipulation rooted in Cold War-era NATO "stay-behind" networks such as Counter-Guerrilla.^[89]^[90] In the broader Middle East, analogous deep state structures arose from post-colonial military bureaucracies that prioritized regime security over democratic accountability, often drawing on Ottoman administrative legacies of centralized control but adapting them to republican authoritarianism. In Egypt, the deep state crystallized after the 1952 Free Officers' coup led by Gamal Abdel Nasser, entrenching the military and intelligence apparatus (including the Mukhabarat) as an autonomous power center that accumulated economic privileges—controlling up to 40% of the economy by the 2010s—and orchestrated the 2013 ouster of elected President Mohamed Morsi, paving the way for Abdel Fattah el-Sisi's rule through a shadow network resistant to civilian oversight.^[91]^[92] Similar patterns manifested in Syria under the Ba'athist regime, where Hafez al-Assad's security mukhabarat formed a parallel state apparatus post-1970 coup, employing familial and sectarian loyalties to suppress dissent and sustain Alawite dominance, a model echoed in Iraq under Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard and intelligence directorates until 2003.^[93] These Middle Eastern variants, while not using the Turkish terminology, reflect causal parallels in how unelected security elites exploit institutional autonomy to perpetuate power amid ideological threats, often with Western acquiescence during Cold War proxy conflicts.^[11]

Russia and Post-Soviet States

In Russia, the concept of a deep state manifests primarily through the siloviki, a network of current and former personnel from security, intelligence, and military services who exert significant influence over governance, often extending beyond the formal directives of elected or appointed leaders. This group, encompassing agencies like the Federal Security Service (FSB), has roots in the Soviet KGB and proliferated under President Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer who served as FSB director from July 1998 to August 1999. By the early 2000s, siloviki occupied key positions across the presidential administration, ministries, and state corporations, with estimates indicating they controlled up to 20-25% of top bureaucratic roles by 2006, enabling them to shape domestic repression, economic resource allocation, and foreign policy decisions such as the 2014 annexation of Crimea.^[94] ^[95] Their influence stems from institutional autonomy, patronage networks, and a worldview emphasizing existential threats from the West, which has hardened Russia's stance on issues like NATO expansion.^[96] The FSB, as the primary domestic intelligence agency, exemplifies this entrenched power, increasingly mirroring KGB functions in surveilling dissent, infiltrating opposition groups, and intervening in elections or protests. Under Putin, the FSB expanded its mandate post-1995 reforms under Boris Yeltsin, gaining authority for warrantless entries and counterintelligence operations that suppress perceived internal threats, as seen in the 2022 poisoning attempts on critics like Alexei Navalny, attributed by independent investigations to FSB operatives.^[97] ^[98] Siloviki factions, while not monolithic—divided between FSB loyalists, military generals, and interior ministry elements—compete for resources yet collectively prioritize regime stability, often sidelining civilian technocrats or oligarchs who challenge their prerogatives, as evidenced by the 2018 purge of defense officials amid corruption probes that consolidated FSB oversight.^[99] This structure fosters a "counterintelligence state" dynamic inherited from Soviet practices, where security services permeate economic and political spheres to neutralize subversion.^[100] In post-Soviet states, analogous deep state elements persist through inherited security apparatuses, particularly in authoritarian regimes aligned with Moscow, such as Belarus, where the KGB (retaining its Soviet name) under President Alexander Lukashenko maintains pervasive control over media, elections, and civil society, exemplified by the 2020 crackdown on protests involving mass detentions and surveillance.^[101] Russia collaborates with these services via intelligence-sharing pacts, as formalized in the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) since 2002, to monitor and repatriate dissidents, reinforcing mutual entrenchment against pro-Western shifts. In Central Asian states like Kazakhstan and Tajikistan, siloviki-like networks from Soviet-era structures influence resource extraction and border security, often prioritizing clan loyalties and anti-reform stances over democratic accountability, though less centralized than in Russia.^[102] Reforms in states like Ukraine post-2014 Euromaidan attempted to dismantle such holdovers by purging SBU (Security Service of Ukraine) leadership tied to Yanukovych-era corruption, yet residual influences persist in hybrid warfare contexts.^[101] These patterns reflect causal continuity from Soviet institutional legacies, where security elites prioritize self-preservation and geopolitical buffers over electoral legitimacy.

China and Authoritarian Variants

In the People's Republic of China, manifestations of deep state-like structures emerge from entrenched factions within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), particularly through the security apparatus, which has periodically developed semi-autonomous influence over policy and resources. Zhou Yongkang, who served as head of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission from 2007 to 2012, consolidated control over domestic security entities including police forces, intelligence agencies, courts, and prosecutorial offices, forming a sprawling network that extended into economic sectors via his prior role in the state oil industry.^[103]^[104] This apparatus, backed by an estimated 1.6 million personnel in public security organs by 2012, enabled systematic surveillance and repression, while Zhou's "petroleum faction" leveraged state-owned enterprises like China National Petroleum Corporation for patronage and corruption.^[105] Xi Jinping's anti-corruption drive, launched in late 2012, targeted this network as a perceived threat to centralized CCP authority; investigations into Zhou began in December 2013, leading to his expulsion from the party in December 2014 and a life sentence in June 2015 for bribery, abuse of power, and disclosure of state secrets.^[106]^[107] The campaign felled over 1.5 million officials by 2017, including security allies like former security minister Fu Zhenghua in 2021, interpreted by observers as dismantling factional strongholds rather than isolated graft, thereby subordinating bureaucratic entrenchment to Xi's personal oversight.^[108]^[109] The Ministry of State Security (MSS), established in 1983 and reporting to the CCP's Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission, exemplifies ongoing unelected influence, overseeing counter-espionage, domestic surveillance, and overseas operations with a budget exceeding $10 billion annually by recent estimates.^[110] Under Xi-era laws like the 2023 Counter-Espionage Law, the MSS has broadened its mandate to include transnational repression of dissidents and influence campaigns abroad, conducting operations that bypass formal diplomatic channels and embed agents in academic and business networks.^[111] In authoritarian variants, analogous security bureaucracies entrench power through ideological loyalty and coercive control. In Iran, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), founded in 1979 post-revolution, operates as a "deep state" superstructure integrating military, intelligence, and economic functions—controlling up to 40% of the economy via conglomerates by 2020—to safeguard the theocratic regime against internal dissent and external threats.^[112]^[113] The IRGC's Quds Force extends this influence regionally, funding proxies like Hezbollah with billions in arms and finance, often overriding elected presidents in foreign policy decisions.^[114] North Korea's Ministry of State Security, reorganized in 2013 under Kim Jong-un, functions as a secret police entity with direct access to the Supreme Leader, deploying an estimated 50,000-100,000 agents for pervasive surveillance, including digital monitoring via "Bureau 27," to preempt challenges to the Kim dynasty.^[115]^[116] This apparatus, subordinate yet indispensable for regime survival, mirrors Chinese precedents in fusing party control with autonomous operational capacity, though purges like those of 2013-2017 underscore periodic reassertion of personal rule over entrenched elements.^[117] Across these systems, security networks sustain authoritarian stability by monopolizing information and force, but invite factional rivalries when aligned with ousted elites, as evidenced by Xi's purges yielding short-term consolidation amid ongoing MSS expansion.^[118]

Other Global Instances

In Western Europe during the Cold War, clandestine stay-behind networks organized by NATO, known collectively as Operation Gladio, exemplified unelected intelligence and military elements operating parallel to democratic governments. Established in the late 1940s and early 1950s across countries including Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, and West Germany, these networks comprised secret arms caches, paramilitary units, and agents trained by the CIA and allied services to conduct sabotage and guerrilla warfare in the event of a Soviet invasion.^[119] Declassified documents and parliamentary inquiries, such as Italy's 1990 revelation by Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, confirmed Gladio's existence and its extension into domestic operations, including the "strategy of tension" where right-wing extremists, with intelligence complicity, executed bombings like the 1969 Piazza Fontana attack in Milan—killing 17 and injuring 88—to discredit left-wing movements and justify authoritarian measures.^[120] In Belgium, similar networks were linked to the 1980s Brabant supermarket massacres, which claimed 28 lives, amid evidence of infiltration by security services to manipulate public fear.^[121] These operations persisted without elected oversight, with national intelligence agencies like Italy's SIFAR maintaining autonomous command structures funded covertly through NATO channels, often evading parliamentary accountability until exposures in the 1990s.^[122] Judicial investigations, including confessions from Gladio operatives like Vincenzo Vinciguerra, revealed deliberate false-flag tactics to preserve anti-communist power blocs against shifting electoral tides, such as Italy's potential communist coalition victories in the 1970s.^[123] While proponents argue these were defensive contingencies, empirical records show their evolution into tools for internal control, undermining civilian rule through unacknowledged violence and propaganda. In Pakistan, the "deep state" refers to the entrenched alliance of the military, particularly the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) directorate, and bureaucratic elites that has recurrently overridden elected governments since the 1950s. This structure orchestrated the first military coup in 1958 under General Ayub Khan, suspending the constitution and imposing martial law, followed by interventions in 1977 and 1999 that deposed Prime Ministers Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, respectively.^[124] The ISI, established in 1948 but expanded post-1950s, maintains off-budget funding from foreign aid—totaling billions in U.S. assistance during the 1980s Afghan jihad—and influences elections, media, and judiciary, as evidenced by its role in engineering Imran Khan's 2022 ouster via a no-confidence vote amid leaked audio of military dissent.^[125] Unlike transient civilian administrations, this network sustains policy continuity on security matters, such as support for Taliban proxies in Afghanistan, irrespective of ruling parties, with military spending consistently at 3-4% of GDP despite economic crises.^[126] Pakistan's deep state exemplifies causal persistence through institutional autonomy: the army's 600,000 active personnel and vast economic holdings—via conglomerates like the Fauji Foundation managing assets worth over $3 billion—create self-reinforcing incentives against full civilian subordination.^[127] Leaked diplomatic cables and analyst reports attribute over half of Pakistan's 33 prime ministers since 1947 facing dismissal or disqualification to military-ISI machinations, prioritizing strategic depth against India over democratic stability.^[128] This model's resilience stems from historical precedents like the 1971 East Pakistan secession, where intelligence failures were reframed to consolidate central power, rendering reform attempts, such as Sharif's 1999 anti-coup measures, futile against entrenched loyalties.^[129]

Controversies and Counterarguments

Labeling as Conspiracy Theory: Origins and Motivations

The labeling of the "deep state" as a conspiracy theory in the United States gained prominence following the 2016 presidential election, particularly as President Donald Trump invoked the term to describe perceived sabotage by intelligence officials and bureaucrats. The phrase itself, adapted from Turkish "derin devlet" denoting military-intelligence networks, was introduced to American discourse by scholar Peter Dale Scott in his 2007 book The Road to 9/11, framing it as a parapolitical system of covert alliances rather than unfounded paranoia. Similarly, former congressional staffer Mike Lofgren popularized a non-conspiratorial definition in his 2016 book The Deep State, portraying it as an entrenched symbiosis of national security apparatus, Wall Street, and Silicon Valley influencing policy beyond electoral accountability. These early usages emphasized empirical patterns of bureaucratic continuity and secrecy, such as post-World War II intelligence expansions, without invoking shadowy cabals.^[34]^[130] The shift toward dismissing the concept as a conspiracy theory accelerated in early 2017, coinciding with leaks from intelligence sources targeting Trump administration figures like National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, whose February 2017 resignation followed classified information disclosures to the press. Media outlets and academics, including linguists analyzing the term's appeal to populist distrust, began equating "deep state" rhetoric with irrational fears of hidden control, echoing historian Richard Hofstadter's 1964 essay on the "paranoid style" in American politics, which pathologized skepticism of elite institutions. This labeling intensified amid investigations into Russian election interference, where actions by FBI officials—later critiqued in a 2019 Department of Justice Inspector General report for procedural irregularities in FISA applications—were reframed by critics as legitimate resistance rather than evidence of institutional bias. Polls from 2018 indicated 73% of respondents perceived a manipulative deep state, yet mainstream narratives prioritized conspiracy dismissals over dissecting verifiable overreaches like unauthorized surveillance.^[131]^[132] Motivations for this labeling appear rooted in institutional self-preservation and ideological alignment, as unelected officials and aligned media outlets sought to shield bureaucratic autonomy from populist scrutiny. Revelations of state secrecy, from the 1961 Bay of Pigs fallout to 1971 Pentagon Papers, historically bred public cynicism toward "invisible government" structures, yet labeling such concerns conspiratorial deflects demands for transparency and reform. Left-leaning sources, despite the concept's origins in critiques by figures like Scott—a critic of neoconservative overreach—dismissed it post-2016 to disassociate from right-wing adoption, preserving a narrative of institutional benevolence amid documented biases in intelligence assessments, such as the Steele dossier's role in 2016 probes. This approach prioritizes narrative control over causal analysis of power imbalances, where empirical events like coordinated leaks undermine claims of mere routine dissent, effectively insulating entrenched networks from accountability.^[132]^[15]

Empirical Evidence vs. Institutional Denials

Declassified documents from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in July 2025 indicate that President Obama directed the Intelligence Community Assessment on Russian election interference shortly after Donald Trump's 2016 victory, with the assessment's conclusions shaped to portray undue Russian favoritism toward Trump despite limited supporting evidence at the time.^[133] This assessment, declassified in parts, has been cited as evidence of post-election efforts by senior officials to retroactively frame Trump's win as compromised, including directives from Obama-era holdovers to prioritize narratives over raw intelligence. Similarly, a 2025 declassified appendix to the Durham Report exposes a Clinton campaign strategy to link Trump to Russia, which the FBI failed to adequately investigate before incorporating into its probes, highlighting procedural lapses in verifying foreign-sourced allegations.^[134] The 2023 Durham Report further documents flaws in the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane investigation, launched in July 2016, which relied on unverified tips from Australian diplomats about Trump aide George Papadopoulos without sufficient corroboration or consideration of alternative explanations, such as opposition research funded by the Democratic National Committee.^[135]^[136] Durham concluded the probe suffered from "confirmation bias" and a lack of analytical rigor, leading to FISA warrant applications on Carter Page that omitted exculpatory information and included fabricated details from Steele dossier sources.^[137] These findings, drawn from interviews and internal FBI records, underscore instances where career officials pursued investigations with minimal predication, bypassing standard protocols for politically sensitive matters. Edward Snowden's 2013 disclosure of NSA programs like PRISM and Upstream revealed bulk collection of Americans' communications under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act, exceeding statutory limits on domestic targeting and lacking individualized warrants.^[138] A 2020 U.S. court ruling declared aspects of this surveillance unlawful, confirming overreach in querying U.S. persons' data without probable cause, as evidenced by internal NSA audits showing incidental collection volumes in the billions annually.^[139] Such revelations demonstrate entrenched surveillance practices operating with limited oversight, independent of elected policy shifts. Institutional responses have consistently denied systemic coordination or malevolence, framing deep state assertions as unfounded paranoia rooted in secrecy rather than misconduct.^[132] Former CIA Director John Brennan, for instance, publicly rejected deep state interference claims during the Trump era, attributing resistance to lawful bureaucratic processes, though subsequent referrals for his role in the Russia assessment suggest potential criminal coordination.^[140] Mainstream analyses, often from outlets with documented left-leaning editorial biases, dismiss empirical indicators as isolated errors rather than patterns of unelected influence, prioritizing institutional defense over causal examination of repeated procedural violations.^[10] This discrepancy persists despite declassifications validating whistleblower accounts, revealing a gap between documented overreach and official narratives that attribute discrepancies to incompetence rather than intent.

Left-Leaning Dismissals and Media Normalization

Left-leaning political commentators and mainstream media outlets have often characterized allegations of a deep state as unfounded conspiracy theories, particularly during the Trump administration, framing them as efforts to undermine legitimate bureaucratic functions. For instance, a 2017 Washington Post analysis described the deep state concept as "President Trump's most compelling conspiracy theory," attributing its appeal to public distrust but dismissing it as lacking evidence of coordinated subversion.^[141] Similarly, a 2020 Vox article acknowledged the existence of entrenched federal bureaucracy but rejected Trump's portrayal of it as a malevolent, politicized entity, arguing instead that it represents routine institutional inertia rather than deliberate opposition.^[142] This dismissal aligns with broader institutional defenses, where outlets like NPR have portrayed deep state claims as the president's invention of a "parallel shadow government," emphasizing instead the role of career officials in upholding norms against perceived executive overreach.^[143] A 2024 New York Times opinion piece went further, rebranding the "deep state" positively as an "awesome" network of unsung experts stabilizing governance, implicitly normalizing bureaucratic autonomy while critiquing efforts to reform it.^[144] Such portrayals often cite polls, like a 2017 Washington Post-ABC News survey finding 48% of Americans believed in a deep state resisting the president, yet frame this belief as populist susceptibility rather than empirical observation of events like intelligence community leaks or FBI actions during the Russia investigation.^[141] Critics from conservative perspectives argue these dismissals reflect a systemic bias in left-leaning media toward protecting institutions ideologically aligned with progressive policies, evidenced by selective outrage over bureaucratic resistance only when it targets right-leaning leaders.^[15] For example, during Trump's first term, reports of anonymous op-eds and official testimonies opposing policy—such as the 2018 New York Times anonymous column by a self-described resistor—were lauded as patriotic rather than indicative of insubordination, contributing to a normalization where deep state behaviors are recast as democratic safeguards.^[145] This pattern persisted post-2020, with media coverage of Trump's 2024 nominees like Kash Patel emphasizing their "conspiracy theorist" labels over documented instances of agency politicization, such as the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane operation later criticized in the Durham report for procedural irregularities.^[146]^[32] Empirical pushback against normalization includes data on federal employee donations, where over 95% of career civil servant contributions in 2020 favored Democrats, suggesting potential ideological entrenchment that dismissals overlook.^[32] Despite this, left-leaning discourse rarely engages causal mechanisms like revolving doors between agencies and advocacy groups, instead attributing deep state rhetoric to authoritarian tendencies, as seen in Scientific American's 2024 analysis linking it to secrecy excesses without addressing verified leaks or whistleblower suppressions.^[132] This selective framing sustains a narrative where institutional critiques are pathologized, even as public trust in media and government remains low, with Gallup polls in 2023 showing only 16% confidence in mass media.^[147]

Responses and Reforms

Political Movements and Populist Backlash

The Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement in the United States exemplifies populist opposition to the deep state, framing it as a network of unelected officials within intelligence agencies, the Justice Department, and bureaucracy that sabotaged Donald Trump's 2016-2020 presidency through leaks, investigations, and policy resistance.^[148] Trump frequently invoked the term in rallies and tweets, alleging the deep state orchestrated the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane investigation into his campaign's Russia ties, which began on July 31, 2016, and led to the Mueller probe concluding in March 2019 with no collusion finding but documenting 140 contacts.^[149] This rhetoric mobilized supporters by portraying the deep state as an anti-democratic force prioritizing institutional preservation over voter mandates, contributing to MAGA's enduring appeal, as evidenced by Trump's 2024 election victory with 312 electoral votes despite legal challenges.^[150] In Europe, populist leaders have channeled similar backlash against supranational bureaucracies akin to deep state structures, particularly the European Union's unelected commissioners and courts overriding national policies on migration and sovereignty. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, in power since 2010, has decried EU mechanisms as a "Brussels deep state" eroding democratic accountability, justifying Fidesz's 2018 constitutional amendments centralizing control over judiciary appointments to counter perceived external interference.^[151] Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, elected in September 2022 with Brothers of Italy securing 26% of the vote, has advocated dismantling EU migrant redistribution quotas, viewing them as bureaucratic overreach bypassing voter referenda, while aligning with Trump on sovereignty restoration.^[152] Marine Le Pen's National Rally in France, gaining 33.2% in the 2022 presidential runoff, echoes this by promising to renegotiate EU treaties to repatriate powers, framing the bloc's technocracy as an unaccountable elite thwarting national will.^[153] Brexit served as a pivotal populist revolt against perceived deep state elements in the UK civil service and judiciary, which former Prime Minister Boris Johnson accused in 2019 of collaborating to "frustrate" the 2016 referendum's 51.9% Leave mandate through delays and legal challenges.^[154] Liz Truss, during her 49-day premiership ending October 25, 2022, attributed her mini-budget's market backlash to a "deep state" of establishment institutions, including the Office for Budget Responsibility and Bank of England officials, who she claimed wielded undue influence against elected reforms.^[155] These claims fueled the European Conservatives and Reformists group's push in the European Parliament, culminating in alliances like the July 2024 Patriots for Europe pact between Orbán, Le Pen, and others to challenge EU federalism.^[156] Globally, these movements reflect a causal pattern where empirical instances of bureaucratic resistance—such as the U.S. intelligence community's 2017 assessments on Russian election interference or EU infringement proceedings against Hungary's 2018 "Stop Soros" laws—have validated populist narratives of entrenched powers subverting electoral outcomes, prompting demands for purges like Trump's proposed Schedule F reclassification of 50,000 federal employees for easier dismissal.^[157] While critics from academia and media often dismiss such backlash as conspiratorial, the movements' electoral successes, including right-wing gains in 10 of 27 EU states by 2024, underscore public distrust in institutions shown by polls like Pew's 2023 finding that 60% of Americans believe the federal government does not represent the people.^[158]

Dismantling Strategies in Practice

In Turkey, following the failed military coup attempt on July 15, 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan implemented aggressive purges targeting institutions perceived as harboring deep state elements, particularly those affiliated with the Fethullah Gülen movement. The government dismissed or suspended approximately 150,000 public employees by mid-2017, including over 4,000 judges and prosecutors, 20,000 military personnel, and tens of thousands of educators and civil servants, often via emergency decree lists compiled through intelligence audits and loyalty assessments.^[159] These actions restructured the judiciary by appointing new judges loyal to the executive, reduced military autonomy through mandatory retirements and promotions favoring Erdoğan allies, and shuttered over 100 media outlets and NGOs suspected of parallel influence networks, effectively centralizing control under the presidency after a 2017 constitutional referendum.^[160] In the United States, during Donald Trump's first term (2017-2021), dismantling efforts focused on executive actions to erode bureaucratic entrenchment, exemplified by Executive Order 13957 issued on October 21, 2020, establishing "Schedule F" to reclassify up to 50,000 policy-influencing civil servants, stripping them of tenure protections under the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 to enable at-will employment and alignment with administration priorities.^[161] Complementary measures included the dismissal of FBI Director James Comey on May 9, 2017, amid investigations into Russian election interference, and subsequent replacements in intelligence roles, alongside the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency advisory group to identify redundant positions.^[162] These initiatives faced legal and institutional resistance, resulting in limited implementation before revocation by President Biden on January 20, 2021, but demonstrated a strategy of reclassification and targeted leadership turnover to counteract perceived unelected influence.^[163] Elsewhere, similar tactics have appeared in authoritarian contexts, such as Sudan's post-2019 transition efforts to dismantle intelligence-state networks inherited from Omar al-Bashir's regime, involving asset seizures from military-commercial conglomerates and purges of security apparatus personnel to curb economic patronage systems.^[164] In practice, these strategies often prioritize rapid executive purges over gradual reforms, yielding short-term loyalty gains but risking institutional instability and retaliatory entrenchment, as evidenced by Turkey's sustained emergency rule until 2018 and ongoing judicial politicization critiques from human rights monitors.^[165]

Recent Developments Post-2024 U.S. Election

Following Donald Trump's victory in the 2024 presidential election, where he secured 312 electoral votes, his second administration initiated measures aimed at curtailing the influence of entrenched federal bureaucrats perceived as resistant to elected leadership.^[166]^[167] On January 20, 2025, the day of his inauguration, Trump issued an executive order reinstating Executive Order 13957, originally from 2020, which created Schedule F to reclassify policy-influencing positions in the federal workforce as excepted service employees, rendering them at-will and subject to easier dismissal for insubordination or misalignment with administration priorities.^[168] This revival, rebranded as Schedule Policy/Career, targeted up to 50,000 positions across agencies, with the Office of Personnel Management proposing formal regulations in April 2025 to implement the changes, despite legal challenges from unions and Democrats arguing it politicizes the civil service.^[169]^[170] Key nominations underscored efforts to reform intelligence and law enforcement institutions long accused of overreach. The Senate confirmed Kash Patel as FBI Director on February 20, 2025, by a narrow vote, placing a Trump ally and critic of prior agency actions—such as the Russia investigation— at the helm of the bureau.^[171] Patel, who had previously vowed to target "deep state" elements involved in alleged abuses against Trump, initiated reviews of past investigations without shuttering the FBI headquarters as once suggested, focusing instead on internal restructuring over his first 100 days.^[172] Complementing this, Russell Vought, confirmed as Office of Management and Budget director and a co-author of Project 2025, advanced deregulatory initiatives and bureaucracy reductions, contributing to a reported shrinkage of tens of thousands of federal positions by September 2025.^[173]^[162] Declassification efforts intensified to expose historical intelligence community actions. In July 2025, the Director of National Intelligence released documents detailing Obama-era efforts to undermine Trump's 2016 campaign, including a National Intelligence Estimate on cyber threats.^[174] Additionally, a declassified appendix to the Durham report revealed details of the Clinton campaign's role in linking Trump to Russia, highlighting FBI failures to scrutinize the allegations adequately.^[175] A cross-agency task force, including intelligence officers, formed by October 2025 to pursue these anti-"deep state" objectives, amid reports of purges in intelligence agencies and broader institutional reforms under new leadership like Tulsi Gabbard as DNI.^[176]^[177] Critics from left-leaning outlets framed these as politicization and authoritarian drift, but proponents cited them as necessary accountability for unelected officials' prior resistance to executive direction.^[178]

References

[1]
The Turkish Origins of the "Deep State" - JSTOR Daily
Apr 10, 2017 · The “deep state” idea of a shadowy parallel government, heard much in the news now, seems to be a concept borrowed from the Turkish experience.
[2]
The Deep State Mirage in Turkey | Council on Foreign Relations
Mar 22, 2017 · The concept of the deep state can be traced back to Turkey, where an alleged network of military officers, intelligence operatives, policemen, organized crime ...
[3]
Explainer: what is the Turkish 'deep state' and why is it in the frame ...
Oct 13, 2015 · The deep state (in Turkish, derin devlet) is best understood as ultra-nationalist networks that consisted of the state's military and security ...
[4]
The Deep State | The New Yorker
Mar 4, 2012 · The deep state, historians say, has functioned as a kind of shadow government, disseminating propaganda to whip up public fear or destabilizing ...
[5]
Essay: Anatomy of the Deep State | BillMoyers.com
Feb 21, 2014 · [1] The term “Deep State” was coined in Turkey and is said to be a system composed of high-level elements within the intelligence services, ...Missing: concept origins
[6]
Introduction to "the Deep State" - MIKE LOFGREN
The term was actually coined in Turkey, and is said to be a system composed of high-level elements within the intelligence services, military, security, ...Missing: concept origins
[7]
Mike lofgren Deep state,
Mike Lofgren worked as a senior analyst in Congress, wrote The Deep State and The Party Is Over, and writes numerous articles on politics.<|separator|>
[8]
Deeper Than the “Deep State”: Follow the Money | Origins
Jul 10, 2025 · In 2016, he named his book The Deep State to describe the power of money to shape decisions by members of both political parties. Building on ...Missing: concept | Show results with:concept
[9]
"The American Deep State" by Jon D. Michaels
In what follows, I argue that the American deep state has very little in common with those regimes usually understood to harbor deep states; that, far from ...
[10]
The Deep State Is Real - POLITICO Magazine
Sep 5, 2017 · Michael Crowley is senior foreign affairs correspondent for Politico. At a conference in mid-July, Barack Obama's CIA director, John Brennan, ...Missing: empirical | Show results with:empirical
[11]
The Origins and Intellectual Structure of the Deep State Literature
Sep 21, 2025 · Despite the recent interest in the deep state topic, the concept remains elusive. This research utilizes bibliometric metadata from 64 ...
[12]
Full article: In Defense of the deep state
Aug 25, 2023 · This article seeks to defend the idea of an American “deep state”. The phrase “deep state” originated in countries like Turkey and Egypt.
[13]
Musk and Ramaswamy, meet the real deep state | Brookings
Nov 18, 2024 · Now, with Republicans poised to lead both chambers of Congress, President-elect Trump is preparing to deliver on his promise to “dismantle ...
[14]
deep state - Wordorigins.org
May 28, 2025 · The phrase is a calque, or loan-translation, of the Turkish derin devlet. The earliest use of the English calque that I'm aware of is cited ...Missing: origin | Show results with:origin
[15]
The Left-Wing Origins of 'Deep State' Theory - Compact Magazine
Feb 28, 2025 · Central to the notion of the deep state is that networks of elites, feeling constrained by democracy, will use illegal methods to circumvent it.
[16]
Origin and evolution of the term "deep state" in political discourse
Mar 12, 2020 · Kaplan's is the earliest significant use of 'deep state', the translation of derin devlet, that I found. It is followed by a fair sprinkling ...
[17]
Deep state | Research Starters - EBSCO
It comes from the Turkish derin devlet, which literally translates as “deep state.” Throughout its history, Turkey has had a reputation for authoritarian ...
[18]
10 surprising things about the 'deep state'—starting with the Roman ...
Jan 9, 2024 · The Roman emperor surrounded himself with a handpicked Praetorian guard to keep him safe. In 41 CE, however, elite members of the guard knifed ...
[19]
The Praetorian Guard: the emperors' fatal servants - HistoryExtra
Aug 16, 2020 · The Praetorian Guard began life as Augustus's bodyguard but evolved into a power-hungry monster responsible for the rise and bloody fall of numerous emperors.Missing: deep | Show results with:deep
[20]
https://www.historyskills.com/classroom/ancient-history/praetorian-guard/
[21]
The Praetorian Guard - Warfare History Network
Created by the first emperor of Rome, Augustus, the Guard was designed to protect the monarch and the royal family, thus extending their reign and keeping the ...
[22]
[PDF] Hidden Power: The Palace Eunuchs of Imperial China
Eunuchs, males who have been rendered sexually impotent by mutilation or removal of the external genitals, served as palace menials, harem.
[23]
USRF - Hidden Power: The Palace Eunuchs of Imperial China
The palace paid 250 taels to the princes for purchasing and training each eunuch. Since this system did not nearly supply the numbers of eunuchs required by the ...
[24]
Byzantine Government - World History Encyclopedia
Apr 13, 2018 · The Byzantine government was headed by an absolute emperor, with officials managing finances, judiciary, military, and bureaucracy. The Senate ...
[25]
ROME AND BYZANTIUM: AN ADMINISTRATIVE OVERVIEW - jstor
Byzantium, we may say, is where something approaching a modern state bureaucracy first emerged on European soil. Its fundamental principles were none other, in ...
[26]
Executive Branch Civilian Employment Since 1940 - OPM
Data comes from agency 113-A monthy submissions and covers total end-of-year civilian employment of full-time permanent, temporary, part-time, and intermittent ...
[27]
How many people work for the federal government? - USAFacts
Dec 19, 2024 · When data tracking began in 1939, the federal workforce was less than one million. It tripled in size over the next five years. By early 1948, ...
[28]
A Government of Strangers: Executive Politics in Washington
Along with Edie Goldenberg, Hugh Heclo is one of the few scholars who has used the idea of the " permanent government " as a point of departure to describe ...
[29]
Is government too big? Reflections on the size and composition of ...
Jan 28, 2025 · The federal government's workforce has remained largely unchanged in size for over 50 years, even as the U.S. population has grown by 68% and ...
[30]
The true size of government is nearing a record high | Brookings
Oct 7, 2020 · As the federal government has hovered close to two million employees for decades, the size of its grant and contract workforce has grown.
[31]
[PDF] Bureaucratic Resistance and the National Security State
For those concerned with the accountability to the public of government decision-makers—the core of the “deep state” fear—these distinctions are critical.
[32]
Gov Exec: Deconstructing the Deep State
A month after President Trump took the oath of office, his chief strategist offered a controversial description of what Americans, including the 2 million ...Missing: empirical | Show results with:empirical
[33]
(PDF) Overhead Agencies and Permanent Government: The Office ...
Aug 6, 2025 · But the concept of “the permanent government” is an idea borrowed from the British system, one that cannot be automatically applied to the ...
[34]
How the Deep State Came to America: A History - War on the Rocks
Feb 4, 2019 · The secretive, extralegal nature of this presumed establishment was essential to what most citizens came to believe was Turkey's deep state.Missing: core | Show results with:core
[35]
National Security Act of 1947 - Office of the Historian
The National Security Act of 1947 reorganized foreign policy and military, creating the NSC, CIA, and merging the War and Navy into the Department of Defense.
[36]
[PDF] US Intelligence Community Reform Studies Since 1947 - CIA
This paper examines 14 official US intelligence reform studies since 1947, exploring their origins, recommendations, and results. The need for a Director of ...
[37]
Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with ...
The Church Committee investigated and identified a wide range of intelligence abuses by federal agencies, including the CIA, FBI, Internal Revenue Service, and ...Missing: autonomy | Show results with:autonomy
[38]
40 years ago, Church Committee investigated Americans spying on ...
May 6, 2015 · The committee held a series of hearings and published 14 reports as it investigated the legality of intelligence operations by the CIA, NSA, and FBI.Missing: autonomy | Show results with:autonomy
[39]
The Iran-Contra Affair 30 Years Later: A Milestone in Post-Truth ...
Nov 25, 2016 · After being explicitly prohibited from aiding the Contras with military or intelligence support, the president and his top advisers had ...Missing: autonomy | Show results with:autonomy
[40]
Walsh Iran / Contra Report - Part XI Concluding Observations
The Iran/contra investigation will not end the kind of abuse of power that it addressed any more than the Watergate investigation did.
[41]
NSA files decoded: Edward Snowden's surveillance revelations ...
Nov 1, 2013 · The Snowden documents show that the NSA runs these surveillance programs through “partnerships” with major US telecom and internet companies.
[42]
The Snowden Affair - The National Security Archive
Sep 4, 2013 · The Snowden leaks have generated broad public debate over issues of security, privacy, and legality inherent in the NSA's surveillance of communications by ...
[43]
[PDF] What Changed After Snowden? A U.S. Perspective
In March 2013—just three months before the first Snowden revelations—the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed a constitutional challenge to an NSA surveillance program.
[44]
The U.S. Intelligence Community and Foreign Policy
Analytical products of the U.S. intelligence community (IC) are intended to provide information for policy makers to understand issues and make decisions.
[45]
[PDF] Covert Action and Clandestine Activities of the Intelligence ...
Since the mid-1970s, Congress's oversight of the Intelligence Community (IC) has been a fundamental component of ensuring that the IC's seventeen diverse ...
[46]
The Intelligence Community and Its Use of Contractors
Aug 18, 2015 · Many experts believe the federal government's reliance on contractors is necessary to accomplish its mission, and this is no less true for the ...
[47]
[PDF] The Intelligence Community and Its Use of Contractors - Congress.gov
Aug 18, 2015 · Contractors have been and are an integral part of the intelligence community's (IC's) total workforce (which also includes federal employees ...
[48]
Booz Allen Hamilton A Major Player In Intelligence Community - NPR
Jun 10, 2013 · Booz Allen Hamilton is one of the largest private contractors that does intelligence work for the government. Its share of the work keeps ...
[49]
Booz Allen Grew Rich on Government Contracts
Jun 9, 2013 · In January, Booz Allen announced that it was starting work on a new contract worth perhaps as much as $5.6 billion over five years to provide ...Missing: CIA | Show results with:CIA<|separator|>
[50]
New Report from Senator Warren Uncovers Defense Industry's ...
Apr 26, 2023 · In 91 percent of these cases, the individuals who went through the revolving door became registered lobbyists for big defense contractors.
[51]
When 80 percent of US generals go to work for arms makers
One practice that introduces bias into the shaping of defense policy is the revolving door between the U.S. government and the weapons industry.
[52]
Brass Parachutes: The Problem of the Pentagon Revolving Door
Nov 5, 2018 · Pentagon officials captured by the contractors they oversee is skewing our spending priorities and foreign policy.
[53]
New Revelations Underscore Need To Curb Defense Revolving Door
May 3, 2023 · The revolving door between the Pentagon, Congress and the weapons industry is a potentially corrupting influence over major policy and ...
[54]
Goldman Sachs' Revolving Door - CBS News
Apr 8, 2010 · For example, former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is a former Goldman CEO; Arthur Levitt, the head of the Securities and Exchange ...
[55]
THE REVOLVING DOOR: 29 People Who Went From Wall Street to ...
Jul 31, 2011 · Joseph Kennedy · Martin Feldstein · Robert Rubin · Laura Tyson · Hank Paulson · Carlos Gutierrez · Faryar Shirzad · Larry Summers.Missing: examples | Show results with:examples
[56]
OpenSecrets panel on defense industry influence explores barriers ...
Jun 27, 2024 · Another mechanism of political influence is lobbying. In Washington D.C., the “revolving door” refers to former federal employees using ...
[57]
Overview - OpenSecrets
A revolving door that shuffles former federal employees into jobs as lobbyists, consultants and strategists just as the door pulls former hired guns into ...Former Members of Congress · Search · Federal Agencies · Top Industries
[58]
https://www.ushistory.org/gov/8a.asp
[59]
Pendleton Act (1883) | National Archives
Feb 8, 2022 · Approved on January 16, 1883, the Pendleton Act established a merit-based system of selecting government officials and supervising their work.
[60]
[PDF] The National Security Act of 1947 – July 26, 1947 - CIA
To promote the national security by providing for a Secretary of Defense; for a National. Military Establishment; for a Department of the Army, a Department of ...
[61]
[PDF] The Creation of the Intelligence Community - GovInfo
Congress passed the National Security Act on 26 July 1947 and President Truman immediately signed it into law. The act gave America something new in the annals ...
[62]
Timeline: How 9/11 Reshaped Foreign Policy
The events of September 11, 2001, set in motion sweeping changes to US intelligence and counterterrorism practices, launched two major wars, and altered ...
[63]
As Leaks Multiply, Fears of a 'Deep State' in America
A wave of leaks from government officials has hobbled the Trump administration, leading some to draw comparisons to countries ...Missing: FBI | Show results with:FBI
[64]
How 'Deep State' book disputes accusations of Trump bias at FBI, DOJ
Oct 10, 2019 · In a new book, Pulitzer winner James B. Stewart explores two controversial recent investigations by the FBI and the Justice Department.Missing: resistance | Show results with:resistance
[65]
Alexander Hamilton (1789-1795) | U.S. Department of the Treasury
Alexander Hamilton (1757- 1804), George Washington's former military aide and a renowned financier, was appointed the first Secretary of the Treasury.Missing: unelected | Show results with:unelected
[66]
The Rise of the Bureaucratic State - SIUE
The number of administrative agencies and employees grew slowly but steadily during the 19th and early 20th centuries and then increased explosively on the ...
[67]
6.4: Reading- Bureaucracy and the Evolution of Public Administration
Aug 1, 2025 · This page details the evolution of U.S. bureaucracy, highlighting its growth due to industrialization and centralized politics.Missing: 19th | Show results with:19th
[68]
The Spoils System: Definition and Summary - ThoughtCo
Apr 29, 2025 · "The Spoils System" was the name given to the practice of hiring and firing federal workers when presidential administrations changed in the 19 ...
[69]
How a Presidential Assassination Led to the End of the Spoils System
Feb 10, 2025 · In the early United States, most presidents operated under something called the “spoils system.” This meant that when new presidents took ...
[70]
The Birth of the Deep State: A History | AIER
Nov 14, 2019 · The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act (1883) created a merit-based system of examinations and other requirements, and a salaried class of ...Missing: 20th precursors
[71]
How the civil service system changed American government - WBUR
Jan 14, 2025 · The Pendleton Act of 1883 established a non-partisan civil service. President-elect Donald Trump says he'll upend the law, firing non-partisan employees and ...
[72]
[PDF] From Merit to Expertise and Back: The Evolution of the U.S. Civil ...
Feb 6, 2020 · One study notes that “from 1883 to 1932 considerable expansion occurred until around 80 percent of Federal employees were under the merit system ...
[73]
Explore the Journey of the Intelligence Community: Our History ...
During the 1950s and 1960s, the Cold War prompted an expansion in both scale and responsibilities for U.S. intelligence agencies. Originating as a unit to ...
[74]
Understanding the CIA: How Covert (and Overt) Operations Were ...
Mar 4, 2019 · CIA Director Allen W. Dulles made a bid in June 1961 for this “Special Group” to have an autonomous ability to approve covert operations ( ...
[75]
The Evolution of the U.S. Intelligence Community-An Historical ...
Intelligence has historically played a key role in providing support to US military forces and in shaping the policies of the United States toward other ...
[76]
The CIA's Appalling Human Experiments With Mind Control
On April 10, 1953, Allen Dulles, the newly appointed director of the CIA, delivered a speech to a gathering of Princeton alumni. Though the event was mundane, ...
[77]
Forbidden history: CIA censorship, The Invisible Government, and ...
Jan 9, 2024 · This article explores the context, legacy and influence of David Wise and Thomas Ross' influential history of the CIA, The Invisible Government.Missing: analogues concept
[78]
[PDF] The Development of U.S. Intelligence During the Cold War
Mar 4, 2024 · This paper aims to outline the development and operation of the massive U.S. Intelligence Community, which currently encompasses 18 ...<|separator|>
[79]
Rolling Back the Post-9/11 Surveillance State
Aug 25, 2021 · Six weeks after the attacks of 9/11, Congress passed the USA Patriot Act. The 131-page law was enacted without amendment and with little ...
[80]
IC Budget - DNI.gov
The US intelligence budget has two major components: the National Intelligence Program and the Military Intelligence Program.
[81]
US intelligence spending has doubled since 9/11, top secret budget ...
Aug 29, 2013 · US spending on intelligence has doubled since 9/11, with the National Security Agency and the CIA taking the biggest share, according to the top secret budget.
[82]
End Mass Surveillance Under the Patriot Act - ACLU
The law amounted to an overnight revision of the nation's surveillance laws that vastly expanded the government's authority to spy on its own citizens.
[83]
U.S. Intelligence Budget Data
The upward trend in intelligence spending since 9/11 is clear from this chart produced by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and published by ...
[84]
[PDF] Report on Matters Related to Intelligence Activities and ...
May 12, 2023 · Counsel Mueller finding a lack of evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign ... Special Counsel Mueller delivered his report to the ...
[85]
I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration
Sep 5, 2018 · The Times is taking the rare step of publishing an anonymous Op-Ed essay. We have done so at the request of the author, a senior official in the ...
[86]
The Rise and Decline of the Turkish “Deep State”: The Ergenekon ...
Oct 1, 2009 · The genesis of the Turkish deep state is traceable to the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP, İttihad ve Terakki Cemiyeti), a secret society ...Missing: precursors | Show results with:precursors
[87]
[PDF] Deep State of Crisis: Re-Assessing Risks to the Turkish State
In previous decades, the term deep state was used to describe the secret, usually sinister forces that were operating in conjunction with the Turkish ...
[88]
Susurluk and the Legacy of Turkey's Dirty War - Jamestown
May 1, 2008 · The Turkish Council of State ordered former Interior Minister Mehmet Agar to stand trial for allegedly “forming a criminal organization” in the dirty war ...
[89]
Turkey's "Deep-State" and the Ergenekon Conundrum
Apr 1, 2009 · Not only is the network guilty of acts of mass violence, it also systematically has engaged in activities that pave the way to military coups.
[90]
Explaining Ergenekon: Civil Military Relations in Turkey's Post-Coup ...
Aug 7, 2013 · Like the Ergenekon case, Balyoz alleges that a group of military officers hatched a coup plot in 2002 to overthrow the AKP.
[91]
The Deep State: How Egypt's Shadow State Won Out - PBS
Sep 17, 2013 · The shadow bureaucracy that makes up Egypt's “deep state” was built up by Mubarak, but it ultimately betrayed him. Since his ouster, the ...
[92]
In Egypt, 'Deep State' vs. 'Brotherhoodization' - Brookings Institution
Proponents of the “deep state” claimed that Mr. Mubarak's financial cronies withheld domestic investment and co-ordinated their capital exodus to raise the ...Missing: historical | Show results with:historical
[93]
[PDF] Deep State in Egypt: From Revolution to Dictatorship
The Middle Eastern origins of the term and its particular applicability to the politics of that region were then further emphasized with reference to Egypt ...
[94]
[PDF] The Siloviki in Putin's Russia: Who They Are and What They Want
The presidential administration, perhaps the most powerful institution in Russian politics, is heavily influenced by the siloviki. As deputy chief of staff, ...
[95]
Reading Russia: The Siloviki in Charge | Journal of Democracy
Since Vladimir Putin's rise to power at the end of the 1990s, siloviki have spread to posts throughout all the branches of power in Russia. The current regime ...Missing: influence deep
[96]
Oligarchs out, 'siloviki' in? Why Russia's foreign policy is hardening.
Feb 2, 2015 · The key narrative of the siloviki, that Russia is surrounded by enemies and must defend itself from external aggression and internal subversion ...
[97]
Russia's FSB Increasingly Playing Ever More Roles Similar to Soviet ...
Jul 1, 2025 · The Federal Security Service (FSB) is increasingly playing the roles its Soviet predecessors did in the suppression of Russian society.
[98]
The FSB: Evolution And Influence In Russian Government
Dec 2, 2024 · The incumbent regime of President Putin relies heavily on the services and insights of FSB to consolidate his power internally and in his ...
[99]
The Russian Siloviki & Political Change | Daedalus - MIT Press Direct
Apr 1, 2017 · The siloviki – Russian security and military personnel – are a key part of Team Putin. They are not, however, a coherent group.
[100]
Russia's Deep State changed Putin's mind - The Sunday Guardian
Mar 21, 2020 · Nowadays the Deep State is largely occupied by the Siloviki, a term derived from “silovye struktury”, or “force structures”. In real terms, ...
[101]
Whose Rules, Whose Sphere? Russian Governance and Influence ...
Jun 30, 2017 · Further, Moscow now collaborates with other states' intelligence and security services in actively monitoring and forcibly returning political ...<|separator|>
[102]
Russia's Shadow War Against the West - CSIS
Mar 18, 2025 · ... Russian government, including President Vladimir Putin, cannot be trusted. ... FSB have also been involved in active measures in Europe ...<|control11|><|separator|>
[103]
Zhou Yongkang: From apex of power to caged 'tiger' in China | CNN
Dec 5, 2014 · At the height of his power, Zhou Yongkang controlled police forces, spy agencies, court systems and prosecution offices across China.
[104]
Power politics exposed by fall of China's security boss - BBC News
Jun 11, 2015 · The fall of China's once all-powerful security boss Zhou Yongkang exposes the power play at the heart of the country's Communist Party ...Missing: faction | Show results with:faction
[105]
Zhou Yongkang: Has Xi caught a 'tiger'? - China Worker
Dec 20, 2013 · 'Oil faction' Zhou Yongkang rose to power through the state-owned oil industry, to become CEO of China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the ...<|control11|><|separator|>
[106]
China expels Zhou Yongkang from Communist party - The Guardian
Dec 5, 2014 · China's Communist party expelled its former security tsar, Zhou Yongkang, months after placing him under investigation for “serious disciplinary violations,”
[107]
China's former security chief given life sentence for corruption
Jun 11, 2015 · China's former security chief and the arch-rival of the president, Xi Jinping, has been sentenced to life in prison for corruption following a secret trial.
[108]
Charting China's 'great purge' under Xi - BBC
Oct 22, 2017 · Zhou Yongkang is the most senior official felled so far. · Abruptly removed from his post in July, Sun Zhengcai is the most senior serving ...
[109]
Xi Jinping's Purges Have Escalated. Here's Why They Are Unlikely ...
Feb 26, 2025 · ... Xi's first term (2012-17) in purging former Minister of Public Security Zhou Yongkang and his people, but Fu was then purged in 2021. A ...
[110]
Counter-Espionage and State Security: The Changing Role of ...
In recent years, China's Ministry of State Security (MSS) has become more visible and more prominent, reflecting an apparent increase in political influence ...
[111]
China's spying efforts growing, with U.S. a top target - CBS News
May 18, 2025 · China's Ministry of State Security, or MSS, is the largest and most active spy agency in the world, according to Lewis. "This is – in scale and ...
[112]
[PDF] The Iranian Deep State - Hoover Institution
The Iranian deep state is composed of “an intricate security, intelligence, and economic superstructure” whose goal is to preserve the fundamental revolutionary.
[113]
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)
The IRGC is one of the most powerful organizations in Iran, conceived as the principal defender of the 1979 revolution, and now a critical link to Islamist ...
[114]
IRGC History and Role in Iranian Statecraft - AHS
The IRGC is a deeply ideological organization, representing Ayatollah Khomeini's conception of Iran as a global revolutionary project rather than a state ...
[115]
State Security Department - North Korea Leadership Watch
The State Security Department is one of the DPRK's chief security and intelligence agencies. Within the DPRK, the SSD constitute a secret police.Missing: deep | Show results with:deep
[116]
Inside North Korea's Top Spy Agency, the Notorious Ministry of State ...
North Korea's Ministry of State Security (MSS) is the counterintelligence service, an autonomous agency that reports directly to leader Kim Jong Un.Missing: deep | Show results with:deep
[117]
Digital Surveillance in North Korea: Moving Toward a Panopticon ...
Apr 16, 2024 · Examining North Korea's digital surveillance capabilities, how they have developed, and worrying trends for the future.
[118]
Iran: Deep state, shallow protests | Lowy Institute
Nov 29, 2022 · When hearing talk of the “deep state”, Iran is perhaps the deepest of them all. The line between state and private sectors is often hard to ...
[119]
Operation Gladio | Geopolitical Monitor
Jun 23, 2008 · Through NATO, working with various Western European intelligence agencies, the CIA set up a network of stay behind “secret armies” which ...
[120]
Operation Gladio: How CIA/Nato carried out terrorist attacks in Italy
Jan 20, 2025 · In 1990, Italian prime minister Giulio Andreotti was forced to reveal the existence of a vast underground paramilitary network that had been ...
[121]
NATO's secret armies: Operation GLADIO and terrorism in Western ...
This fascinating new study shows how the CIA and the British secret service, in collaboration with the military alliance NATO and European military secret ...
[122]
Through a Glass, Darkly: US-Italian Intelligence Cooperation, Covert ...
Mar 8, 2024 · It demonstrates that Gladio did not occupy a central role in US covert operations against communism until 1976 and that CIA pressures on the ...
[123]
An approach to operation Gladio and terrorism in cold war Italy
Aug 7, 2025 · The document, dated 1 June 1959, had been compiled by the Italian military secret service SIFAR and is entitled “The special forces of SIFAR and ...<|separator|>
[124]
The Pakistani Deep State - The Friday Times
Oct 2, 2023 · Since early 1950s till today, the characteristics of a deep state are to be found in Pakistan where the nexus of the military and bureaucracy ...
[125]
Pakistan's Deep-state: Decoding the Trajectory in a New Orbit
Nov 26, 2022 · The deep state or establishment constitutes Pakistan Army and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and it has always been in the driving seat ...
[126]
Deep State Continuum in Pakistan and Implications for India
Mar 9, 2023 · The deep State refers to a shadowy clique of influential actors that are involved in the secret manipulation or control of government.
[127]
Pakistani Deep State - Tags | ORF
Bolton's tough job: Controlling Pakistan's deep state · Vikram Sood | Holger Rogner · 'Deep state' ensures Pakistan's parties in disarray in election year.
[128]
the deep state in action military influence on pakistans political ...
The term Deep State from Pakistani political circles means the military takes over government decisions and avoids civilian monitoring to handle defense affairs ...
[129]
DEEP STATE: PAKISTAN AND CHINA EXAMPLES - SRIRAM's IAS
May 22, 2024 · In Pakistan, the deep state is often associated with the military and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The military has historically ...
[130]
The Deep State: The Fall of the Constitution and the Rise of a ...
30-day returnsThe New York Times bestselling author of The Party Is Over delivers a no-holds-barred exposé of who really wields power in Washington.Missing: origins | Show results with:origins
[131]
Opinion: Why The Term 'Deep State' Speaks To Conspiracy Theorists
Aug 9, 2018 · Linguist Geoff Nunberg says it's common for citizens of democracies to express concerns about the government. But the term "deep state" ...
[132]
State Secrecy Explains the Origins of the 'Deep State' Conspiracy ...
Feb 6, 2024 · Lost in today's misinformation fights is the recognition that modern conspiracy theories spring from excesses of state secrecy.Missing: empirical | Show results with:empirical
[133]
New Evidence Uncovers Obama-Directed Creation of False ...
Jul 23, 2025 · President Obama directed the creation of this January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment after President Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in ...
[134]
Newly Declassified Appendix to Durham Report Sheds Additional ...
Jul 31, 2025 · Newly Declassified Appendix to Durham Report Sheds Additional Light on Clinton Campaign Plan to Falsely Tie Trump to Russia and FBI's Failure to ...
[135]
Durham report faults FBI's Trump-Russia probe - POLITICO
May 15, 2023 · Durham's long-awaited, 306-page report slams the FBI's handling of the Trump-Russia probe as deeply flawed. But Durham's investigation into ...
[136]
Durham report criticizes FBI for launching 2016 Trump-Russia probe
May 15, 2023 · But Durham argued that the FBI acted too hastily when it opened the Crossfire Hurricane investigation in July 2016, after a Trump campaign aide ...
[137]
FBI, DOJ's Trump-Russia 'collusion' probe was 'seriously flawed,' no ...
May 15, 2023 · FBI, DOJ's Trump-Russia 'collusion' probe was 'seriously flawed,' no basis in evidence when opened: Durham ; John Durham · Ron Sachs – CNP.<|separator|>
[138]
3 Years Later, the Snowden Leaks Have Changed How the World ...
Jun 5, 2016 · Three years ago today, the world got powerful confirmation that the NSA was spying on the digital lives of hundreds of millions of innocent people.
[139]
NSA surveillance exposed by Snowden ruled unlawful - BBC
Sep 3, 2020 · A National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance program has been ruled unlawful, seven years after it was exposed by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
[140]
https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2025-10-21-jdj-to-doj-bondi-re-brennan-criminal-referral.pdf
[141]
The 'deep state' is President Trump's most compelling conspiracy ...
Apr 27, 2017 · A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows about half of Americans (48 percent) believe in the concept of a deep state.
[142]
The “deep state” is real. But it's not what Trump thinks it is. - Vox
May 13, 2020 · Author David Rohde explains how the “deep state” evolved into a sprawling conspiracy theory. by Sean Illing. May 13, 2020, 8:00 AM PDT.Missing: motivations | Show results with:motivations
[143]
'In Deep' Challenges President Trump's Notion Of A Deep-State ...
and argues that the president is the one creating a parallel shadow government ...Missing: motivations dismissing
[144]
Opinion | It Turns Out the 'Deep State' Is Actually Kind of Awesome
... Out the 'Deep State' Is Actually Kind of Awesome. Meet the unsung heroes making our country great. By Adam Westbrook and Lindsay Crouse. March 19, 2024.
[145]
Trump's War on the 'Deep State' Turns Against Him
Oct 23, 2019 · The impeachment inquiry is in some ways the culmination of a battle between the president and the government institutions he distrusted and ...
[146]
How Kash Patel has promoted conspiracy theories - NPR
Dec 9, 2024 · Trump's pick to head the FBI has parlayed his time serving in various national security roles in the first Trump administration to building ...
[147]
Trump Takes On the Pillars of the 'Deep State' - The New York Times
Nov 14, 2024 · The Justice Department, Pentagon and intelligence agencies were the three areas of government that proved to be the most stubborn obstacles ...
[148]
A Deep State of His Own: How Trump Plans to Weaponize America's ...
Jun 10, 2024 · In March 2023, Donald Trump kicked off his third presidential run in Waco, Texas. His arrival coincided with the 30th anniversary of the ...<|separator|>
[149]
Populism and the Deep State: The Attack on Public Service Under ...
Aug 17, 2021 · This chapter addresses the ways in which the Trump administration has exemplified and accelerated a long-term trend toward democratic backsliding in the United ...
[150]
The MAGA Ideology and the Trump Regime - Monthly Review
One week after the January 20, 2025, inauguration of Donald Trump in his second stint as U.S. president, Matthew J. Vaeth, acting director of the Office of ...
[151]
Rise to the challengers: Europe's populist parties and its foreign ...
Jun 12, 2025 · Europe's “challengers”, or populist parties, are increasingly influencing the continent's foreign policy.
[152]
With Trump's Victory, Europe's Populist Right Sees Return of a ...
Nov 8, 2024 · Viktor Orban of Hungary and other right-wing European politicians hail the return of a US president who shares their tough views on issues like immigration.
[153]
Orbán urges Meloni, Le Pen to team up and create right-wing EU ...
May 30, 2024 · Orbán urges Meloni, Le Pen to team up and create right-wing EU super group ... It's time to “reshape” the European right, said Hungarian prime ...
[154]
Boris Johnson blasted over claims 'deep state' is betraying Brexit
Speaking to LBC, Mr Johnson also hit out at MPs seeking to halt Brexit - and warned those seeking to overturn the referendum result that they were were “playing ...
[155]
Former British premier blames 'deep state' for her brief tenure
Feb 26, 2024 · Liz Truss says she faced 'a huge establishment backlash' during her time as prime minister - Anadolu Ajansı.
[156]
Le Pen and Orbán join forces in European parliament far-right alliance
Jul 8, 2024 · Le Pen and Orbán join forces in European parliament far-right alliance. The group, styled Patriots for Europe, becomes the third-largest force and largest-ever ...Missing: deep | Show results with:deep
[157]
The Symbolic Politics of Status in the MAGA Movement
Sep 3, 2025 · Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork among Make America Great Again (MAGA) activists during the 2020 presidential campaign, we explore the ...
[158]
Trump 2.0: The Rise of an 'Anti-Elite' Elite in US Politics - Sciences Po
Jan 30, 2025 · The aim of this “alter elite” is to replace the “regular” Democrat elites, but also the moderate Republicans, by deeply discrediting their ...
[159]
From purges to a 'new Turkey' – the final stage of the state's ...
Dec 7, 2016 · The purges, which have been underway since the coup attempt across the entire state apparatus, are a continuation[1] of the campaign targeting ...
[160]
Erdogan's Purge to Coup-Proof Turkey's Military May Backfire
Aug 16, 2016 · In the hours after the coup began, rumors spread that Erdogan was even resorting to NATO ally Germany for protection. A senior U.S. official ...
[161]
Trump's Schedule F plan, explained - Protect Democracy
Jun 11, 2024 · In October 2020, the Trump Administration issued an executive order called Schedule F that would have stripped protections from civil ...Missing: dismantle | Show results with:dismantle<|separator|>
[162]
The 'deep state' is proving to Trump it's a worthy foe - POLITICO
Sep 14, 2025 · President Donald Trump and his team are crowing about the downsizing of the federal bureaucracy, which is set to shrink by tens of thousands ...Missing: Schedule | Show results with:Schedule
[163]
Does Trump have the right idea about dismantling the Deep State?
Oct 7, 2024 · COMMENTARY | "Trump's diagnosis is correct in part but his reform proposal badly misses the target," writes one observer.Missing: administration | Show results with:administration
[164]
[PDF] Dismantling the 'Deep State' in Sudan
Oct 13, 2020 · What emerged was a highly developed intelligence state, a plethora of formal military and informal militia actors, and an economic model that ...
[165]
Erdogan's Coup Proofing: why should Greece care? - ΕΛΙΑΜΕΠ
Jul 31, 2024 · These include extensive officer purges, Presidential involvement in officer promotions, and the political instrumentalization of the operations ...
[166]
Presidential Election of 2024 - 270toWin.com
Results of the presidential election of 2024, won by Donald J. Trump with 312 electoral votes.2024 Presidential Election... · 2024 Election Results · 2024 Senate Election Live...
[167]
Presidential Election Results 2024: Electoral Votes & Map by State
Donald Trump is the next president of the United States. He racked up victories in all seven swing states, from the Rust Belt to the Sun Belt, to clinch 312 ...<|separator|>
[168]
Restoring Accountability To Policy-Influencing Positions Within the ...
Jan 20, 2025 · Executive Order 13957 of October 21, 2020 (Creating Schedule F in the Excepted Service), is hereby immediately reinstated with full force ...
[169]
OPM proposes rule to formally revive Schedule F
Apr 18, 2025 · The Office of Personnel Management on Friday filed proposed regulations that would formally revive Schedule F, setting the stage for tens of thousands of ...
[170]
Trump Administration Moves Forward with Implementing Schedule F
“He's starting the process of reclassifying 50,000 federal employees under what's known as Schedule F, which can make civil servants into political appointees ...
[171]
WATCH: Senate narrowly votes to confirm Kash Patel as FBI director
Feb 20, 2025 · The vote puts the Trump loyalist atop the nation's premier federal law enforcement agency despite Democrats' doubts about his qualifications ...Missing: impact | Show results with:impact
[172]
FBI Director Patel, a longtime bureau critic, begins to put his stamp ...
Jun 5, 2025 · Since taking the helm more than 100 days ago, Patel has yet to shutter the FBI headquarters and reopen it as a museum as he once said he ...
[173]
Russell Vought, Donald Trump's Deep-State Wrecking Ball
Oct 17, 2025 · A profile of the director of the Office of Management and Budget, an author of Project 2025, and a self-described Christian nationalist, ...
[174]
[PDF] APPROVED FOR RELEASE BY THE DNI ON 17 JULY 2025
Jul 17, 2025 · Yes; at the WH session today chaired by Denis, I brought up that I had asked my team to produce an NIE on cyber threats to our electoral ...<|separator|>
[175]
Newly Declassified Appendix to Durham Report Sheds Additional ...
Jul 31, 2025 · The Durham annex contains previously classified information exposing a reported Clinton campaign plan to falsely tie President Donald Trump to ...
[176]
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/wide-ranging-group-us-officials-pursues-trumps-fight-against-deep-state-2025-10-20/
[177]
Trump's moment to reform the US intelligence community
May 9, 2025 · This call to arms was reinforced just a few months later by Tulsi Gabbard, the new director of national intelligence (DNI), when she set out the ...
[178]
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2025/10/21/the-trump-administration-s-politicization-of-us-national-security_6746641_4.html