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From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight

Kevin Thomas Fahey Orcid Logo, Luca Trenta Orcid Logo, Douglas B. Atkinson Orcid Logo

American Politics Research

Swansea University Author: Luca Trenta Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.1177/1532673x261443526

Abstract

Congress has a long history of deference to the Executive with regard to foreign policy and the intelligence community. During the Cold War in particular, Congress often wished to be kept at arm’s reach from covert operations conducted by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations. Yet i...

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Published in: American Politics Research
ISSN: 1532-673X 1552-3373
Published: SAGE Publications 2026
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa71720
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last_indexed 2026-06-09T08:54:22Z
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spelling 2026-06-08T14:24:58.3351292 v2 71720 2026-04-08 From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight 77a2eaf23b410b1d6a38ea070f14f992 0000-0001-5681-8176 Luca Trenta Luca Trenta true false 2026-04-08 SOSS Congress has a long history of deference to the Executive with regard to foreign policy and the intelligence community. During the Cold War in particular, Congress often wished to be kept at arm’s reach from covert operations conducted by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations. Yet in the 1980s, Members of Congress began to assert themselves over the Reagan administration’s covert operation to provide aid and weapons to the contras in Nicaragua. We articulate a theory showing how backbenchers moved intelligence committee members away from deference and into a more polarized, adversarial posture. We then investigate the mechanisms of this theory with a novel dataset of speeches of Members of Congress, 1981-1983, on the topic of Nicaragua. We find that intelligence committee members’ rhetoric began to shift towards the rhetoric of backbenchers as more revelations about the covert operation are made public. These findings suggest that the modern confrontational attitude of Congress toward the intelligence agencies has its roots in the 1980s, rather than the 1990s, and demonstrate a new mechanism by which Congress oversees the executive. Journal Article American Politics Research 0 SAGE Publications 1532-673X 1552-3373 covert operations, Congress, partisan polarization, intelligence 23 5 2026 2026-05-23 10.1177/1532673x261443526 COLLEGE NANME Social Sciences School COLLEGE CODE SOSS Swansea University Not Required British Academy SRG21/211237 2026-06-08T14:24:58.3351292 2026-04-08T12:06:13.6312119 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences School of Social Sciences - Politics, Philosophy and International Relations Kevin Thomas Fahey 0000-0002-5200-4850 1 Luca Trenta 0000-0001-5681-8176 2 Douglas B. Atkinson 0000-0003-4628-1664 3 71720__36881__685a9a7d69f7474c972680b7ba86faaf.pdf 71720.AAM.pdf 2026-06-08T14:21:35.2795066 Output 671043 application/pdf Accepted Manuscript true Author accepted manuscript document released under the terms of a Creative Commons CC-BY licence using the Swansea University Research Publications Policy (rights retention). true eng https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
title From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
spellingShingle From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
Luca Trenta
title_short From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
title_full From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
title_fullStr From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
title_full_unstemmed From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
title_sort From Consensus to Fracture: Reagan, the Contras, and the Politics of Intelligence Oversight
author_id_str_mv 77a2eaf23b410b1d6a38ea070f14f992
author_id_fullname_str_mv 77a2eaf23b410b1d6a38ea070f14f992_***_Luca Trenta
author Luca Trenta
author2 Kevin Thomas Fahey
Luca Trenta
Douglas B. Atkinson
format Journal article
container_title American Politics Research
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publishDate 2026
institution Swansea University
issn 1532-673X
1552-3373
doi_str_mv 10.1177/1532673x261443526
publisher SAGE Publications
college_str Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
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hierarchy_top_id facultyofhumanitiesandsocialsciences
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofhumanitiesandsocialsciences
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
department_str School of Social Sciences - Politics, Philosophy and International Relations{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences{{{_:::_}}}School of Social Sciences - Politics, Philosophy and International Relations
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description Congress has a long history of deference to the Executive with regard to foreign policy and the intelligence community. During the Cold War in particular, Congress often wished to be kept at arm’s reach from covert operations conducted by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations. Yet in the 1980s, Members of Congress began to assert themselves over the Reagan administration’s covert operation to provide aid and weapons to the contras in Nicaragua. We articulate a theory showing how backbenchers moved intelligence committee members away from deference and into a more polarized, adversarial posture. We then investigate the mechanisms of this theory with a novel dataset of speeches of Members of Congress, 1981-1983, on the topic of Nicaragua. We find that intelligence committee members’ rhetoric began to shift towards the rhetoric of backbenchers as more revelations about the covert operation are made public. These findings suggest that the modern confrontational attitude of Congress toward the intelligence agencies has its roots in the 1980s, rather than the 1990s, and demonstrate a new mechanism by which Congress oversees the executive.
published_date 2026-05-23T06:01:50Z
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