The Threats We're Not Allowed to Name

If you erase the threat, you can ignore the consequences.

The 2025 Annual Threat Assessment released this week by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) is a troubling document—not because of what it says, but because of what it omits.

Climate change is missing from an official U.S. intelligence assessment of global threats for the first time in years. No mention of it as a "threat multiplier." No mention of how climate shocks fuel migration, destabilize fragile governments or ignite resource-driven conflict. No mention of the national security risks posed by rising sea levels, Arctic militarization, or competition over critical water and food supplies. It's not that these threats have gone away. In fact, they've intensified. What's changed is the political leadership—and the willingness to confront inconvenient truths.

The 2024 Annual Threat Assessment clearly identified climate change. It warned of the national security risks of climate-driven instability, the geopolitical consequences of melting Arctic ice, and how extreme weather was impacting military readiness, infrastructure, and global supply chains. The report detailed how the convergence of climate stressors and poor governance could lead to violent conflict, particularly in regions already under strain.

Now, in 2025, all of that is gone. Deleted.

I wish I could say I'm surprised. But I've seen this before–from the inside. During the first Trump administration, I worked on homeland security and national resilience. We were tasked with preparing the country for all hazards—terrorism, pandemics, cyberattacks, and, yes, climate-related disasters. But we weren't allowed to say the words "climate change." It didn't matter that the science was precise, that the risks were growing, or that our allies were preparing for what we all knew was coming. The White House didn't want it acknowledged—full stop.

I remember when we drafted a strategic plan for the Arctic—an increasingly contested region where Russia and China are expanding their influence and where melting ice is opening new lanes for military and economic competition. The document laid out the climate dynamics and national security implications, but we were blocked from releasing it. We were told not to talk about it publicly. A threat we were witnessing unfold in real time was effectively silenced—because it didn't fit the political narrative.

What's Left Unsaid Speaks Volumes

Ironically, while the new Gabbard-led DNI assessment scrubs all mention of climate change, someone seems to have forgotten to delete a section that still outlines the national security stakes in the Arctic. The 2025 report states:

"Russia controls about half of all Arctic coastline and views the region as essential to its economic well-being and national security. Moscow wants to further develop its Arctic oil and gas reserves and position itself to reap benefits from expected increases in maritime trade... Russia's interest in Greenland is focused mainly on its proximity to strategically important naval routes between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans—including for nuclear-armed submarines—and the fact that Greenland hosts a key U.S. military base."

This isn't a throwaway detail. It's a quiet acknowledgment of the growing strategic competition in the Arctic, even as the broader environmental context is deliberately erased. This is particularly alarming because Donald Trump has revived his obsession with acquiring Greenland. Vice President JD Vance and his wife are even traveling there this week. When you pair this diplomatic move with an intelligence assessment that emphasizes the region's military value (while omitting the climate instability making it accessible), a troubling pattern emerges.

By reframing Greenland not as an environmental hotspot requiring multilateral cooperation but as a strategic asset ripe for unilateral moves, the administration effectively aligns with Russia's vision for a militarized Arctic. By erasing climate change from the equation, they make it easier to ignore the urgency of international cooperation. This isn't just bad policy–it's handing Putin exactly what he wants.

With Donald Trump back in office and Tulsi Gabbard at the helm of the ODNI, we are witnessing the same politically driven suppression of inconvenient facts, this time codified in our nation's most crucial unclassified threat assessment. And it couldn't come at a worse time. When asked directly this week why climate change was removed from the 2025 report, Gabbard responded, "I don't recall giving that instruction." That kind of answer doesn't inspire confidence. Either she knowingly approved it—or she's presiding over an intelligence community that's now preemptively censoring itself to align with political expectations.

This selective memory is becoming a pattern in the administration. In what's now being called "SignalGate," Gabbard also claimed she couldn't recall whether she used her personal or work phone to access Signal chats where classified war planning discussions allegedly took place. This should be shocking—the nation's top intelligence official participating in sensitive conversations outside official channels, then conveniently forgetting the details. This is who's overseeing U.S. intelligence in 2025.

Beyond Climate: Other Threats Erased

Climate change isn't the only critical threat that has disappeared in this report. The 2025 assessment also omits any mention of white supremacy, domestic violent extremism, or racially motivated terrorism—despite years of consensus across the intelligence community that these are among the most persistent and deadly threats to Americans on U.S. soil. The 2024 report acknowledged that reality. This one does not.

Once again, I've seen this before. During Trump's first term, I sat in rooms where top national security officials were warned about the rise of violent white supremacist extremism—and watched as those warnings were minimized or ignored. Reports were buried. The language was softened. There was a conscious effort to avoid even using the term "white supremacy."

That's how we got to January 6.

This pattern of ignoring inconvenient threats has real consequences. When we erase climate change from our threat assessments, it makes it easier for Cabinet members—like DHS Secretary Kristi Noem—to casually suggest eliminating FEMA altogether, which is exactly what she said in this week's cabinet meeting. The two go hand in hand: ignore the threat, and you justify gutting the response.

The bottom line is this: a threat assessment should be grounded in facts, not filtered through politics. It should tell the truth—not what the president wants to hear. When intelligence is shaped to fit a narrative, we all lose. I saw it happen during Trump's first term, and now, we are watching it happen in real-time, with even more at stake.

And I guess my question is: Did climate change stop mattering over the past year? Did white supremacy disappear? Of course not. If anything, these threats have grown more urgent.

What we're witnessing isn't just political maneuvering. It's a dereliction of duty—and there seems to be a lot of that going around.

More soon,

Olivia