A Trump administration official told Fox News that Trump’s expected action would be directed at the 51 ex-officials who “lied” about Hunter Biden’s laptop in the letter, which was published two weeks before the election.

Among the letter’s signatories were three former CIA directors, including John Brennan, as well as former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. It is unclear whether all 51 signatories still possess security clearances. Trump said in 2018 that he used his presidential authority to revoke Brennan’s, but Brennan later said he was uncertain about whether the revocation ever actually took place. The Washington Examiner reached out to the CIA for comment.

The letter became a flashpoint in the 2020 election. The 51 officials alleged in it that a damning story in the New York Post published in October that year about the Bidens might have been Russian disinformation, thereby casting doubt on the story.

“The arrival on the US political scene of emails purportedly belonging to Vice President Biden’s son Hunter, much of it related to his time serving on the Board of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma, has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation,” the officials wrote.

The New York Post had reported that Joe Biden allegedly used his vice presidential power to strong-arm Ukraine for Hunter Biden’s personal benefit. The outlet based its story off emails buried in a copy of Hunter Biden’s hard drive, which it received from former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani. The New York Post said a Delaware computer repair shop owner had given Giuliani’s representative the hard drive copy.

Hunter Biden had abandoned his laptop and hard drive at the Delaware shop in 2019. Court records revealed that the shop owner handed over the laptop and original hard drive to the FBI later that year in response to a subpoena. An FBI official confirmed during Hunter Biden’s trial in Delaware last year that the laptop and hard drive were authentic, though the official did not verify the authenticity of all of the data on the hard drive copies that Giuliani and other Republican operatives disseminated to the New York Post and other media.

The letter, coming from officials who once worked in some of the highest national security and intelligence roles in the government, carried significant weight and resulted in then-candidate Joe Biden relying on it to dismiss the New York Post’s story during the final presidential debate.

House Republicans also uncovered that one of the letter’s authors, former Acting CIA Director Mike Morell, had explicitly initiated the letter in part because he wanted to give Joe Biden a “talking point” for the debate. Morell emphasized to Congress that he also was sincerely concerned about Russia meddling in the election.

Still, Morell and the other signatories have continued to face criticism from Trump supporters for producing such an influential document at the height of a competitive presidential election, when it was bound to affect the race.

Attorney Mark Zaid, who represents eight of the 51 signatories, told the Washington Examiner Trump’s executive action to suspend their security clearances would defy decades of precedent.

“It would be contrary to decades of national security norms to suspend the security clearances of individuals who did nothing other than, as private citizens, exercise their protected First Amendment rights, Zaid said. “Such an action would be unprecedented and undeserved, especially given many of the signatories spent their entire careers serving apolitically to protect the American people.”

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Zaid also said the move would fly in the face of Trump’s calls to protect free speech, particularly on the social media apps TikTok and X.

“It is also quite ironic that at the same time this Executive Order is issued the White House claims it supports the restoration of freedom of speech and seeks to end federal censorship,” Zaid said.