Michael Flynn

He also served with the 25th Infantry Division at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, at the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, Louisiana, and the Army Intelligence Center at Fort Huachuca, Arizona.

Michael Thomas Flynn (born December 24, 1958) is a retired United States Army lieutenant general who was the 24th U.S. national security advisor for the first 22 days of the Trump administration.

He resigned in light of reports that he had lied regarding conversations with Russian ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak.

Flynn's military career included a key role in shaping U.S. counterterrorism strategy and dismantling insurgent networks in the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars, and he was given numerous combat arms, conventional, and special operations senior intelligence assignments.

On July 24, 1972, after a local girl climbed into a car and accidentally released the parking brake, Flynn and a friend of his rushed to save two toddlers in its path; he was honored by the local town council for this act of heroism.

Flynn served time in juvenile detention for what he has described as "serious and unlawful activity" in his youth, the records of which were expunged after he served a year of supervised probation.

While at Middletown High School, Flynn met Lori Andrade, daughter of a prominent Portuguese family on Aquidneck Island, whom he married in 1981.

He attended the University of Rhode Island where he initially struggled academically, earning a 1.2 GPA during his freshman year, however he was later awarded a three-year scholarship by the Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) and ultimately decided not to drop out.

He graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in management science in 1981 and was a Distinguished Military Graduate of the ROTC.

Flynn later earned a Master of Business Administration in Telecommunications from Golden Gate University, a Master of Military Art and Science from the United States Army Command and General Staff College, and a Master of Arts in National Security and Strategic Studies from the Naval War College.

He is a graduate of the Military Intelligence Officer Basic Course, Ranger School, Military Intelligence Officer Advanced Course, Army Command and General Staff College, the School of Advanced Military Studies, and Naval War College.

Flynn was commissioned in the U.S. Army as a second lieutenant in military intelligence in 1981.

His military assignments included multiple tours at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, with the 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, and Joint Special Operations Command, where he deployed for the invasion of Grenada and Operation Uphold Democracy in Haiti.

Initially, Flynn was not going to be deployed to Grenada in 1983, but he was able to convince a superior officer to have him included.

While serving there, Flynn took a 40-foot leap off a cliff to retrieve two soldiers stranded in the ocean and bring them back to shore to be airlifted.

He became the 18th director of the Defense Intelligence Agency in July 2012 until his forced retirement from the military in August 2014.

During his tenure he gave a lecture on leadership at the Moscow headquarters of the Russian military intelligence directorate GRU, the first American official to be admitted entry to the headquarters.

After leaving the military, in October 2014 he established Flynn Intel Group, which provided intelligence services for businesses and governments, including in Turkey.

In December 2015, Flynn was paid $45,000 to deliver a Moscow speech at the ten-year anniversary celebration of RT, a state-controlled Russian international television network, where he sat next to Russian president Vladimir Putin at his banquet table.

In February 2016, Flynn became a national security advisor to Trump for his 2016 presidential campaign.

In March 2017, Flynn retroactively registered as a foreign agent, acknowledging that in 2016 he had conducted paid lobbying work that may have benefited Turkey's government.

On January 22, 2017, Flynn was sworn in as the National Security Advisor.

On February 13, 2017, he resigned after information surfaced that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence and others about the nature and content of his communications with Kislyak.

Flynn's tenure as the National Security Advisor is the shortest in the history of the position.

In December 2017, Flynn formalized a deal with Special Counsel Robert Mueller to plead guilty to a felony count of "willfully and knowingly" making false statements to the FBI about the Kislyak communications, and agreed to cooperate with the Special Counsel's investigation.

In June 2019, Flynn dismissed his attorneys and retained Sidney Powell, who on the same day wrote to attorney general Bill Barr seeking his assistance in exonerating Flynn.

Powell had discussed the case on Fox News and spoken to President Trump about it on several occasions.

Two weeks before his scheduled sentencing, in January 2020 Flynn moved to withdraw his guilty plea, claiming government vindictiveness and breach of the plea agreement.

At Barr's direction, the Justice Department filed a court motion to drop all charges against Flynn on May 7, 2020.

Presiding federal judge Emmet Sullivan ruled the matter to be placed on hold to solicit amicus curiae briefs from third parties.

Powell then asked the DC Circuit Court of Appeals to compel Sullivan to drop the case, but her request was denied.

On November 25, 2020, Flynn was issued a presidential pardon by Trump.

On December 8, 2020, Judge Sullivan dismissed the criminal case against Flynn, stating he probably would have denied the Justice Department motion to drop the case.

On July 4, 2020, Flynn pledged an oath to the pro-Trump QAnon conspiracy theory, and as Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in which he was defeated, Flynn suggested the president should suspend the Constitution, silence the press, and hold a new election under military authority.

Flynn later met with Trump and their attorney Powell in the Oval Office to discuss the president's options.

Trump denied reports that Flynn's martial law idea had been discussed.

Flynn has since become a prominent leader in the Christian nationalist movement, organizing and recruiting for what he characterizes as a spiritual and political war.

Michael Thomas Flynn was born and raised in Middletown, Rhode Island, one of nine siblings born to Helen Frances (née Andrews), who worked in real estate, and Charles Francis Flynn, a small-town banker, both Catholics of Irish descent.

Flynn's family has a long tradition of serving in the armed forces; Helen's brother was a Navy submarine captain and their father an officer in World War II, Charles's father, Henry E. "Harry" Flynn, served in the Army during World War I, and Charles himself served in World War II and fought during the Battle of the Bulge while traveling under General George S. Patton.

Flynn's younger brother, Charles A. Flynn, is a four-star general.