WASHINGTON – As President Donald Trump continues to bash the extraordinary criticism from within his administration, Vice President Mike Pence and other officials began denying authorship of an op-ed that has thrown the administration into turmoil. "The Vice President puts his name on his Op-Eds," tweeted Jarrod Agen, communications director for Pence. "The @nytimes should be ashamed and so should the person who wrote the false, illogical, and gutless op-ed. Our office is above such amateur acts." Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, during a trip to India, told reporters "it's not mine," and denounced the Times for publishing the anonymous article that indicates Trump may be facing the prospect of revolt within his own administration. More:Anonymous senior Trump official blasts president as erratic and amoral: 'I am part of the resistance' More:Whodunit? Social media users search for anonymous Trump official who penned scathing NYT essay Internet sleuths had identified Pence as a suspect because the piece uses the term "lodestar," one of the vice president's favorite words. The New York Times published an op-ed from an anonymous Trump official who said staff members are working to block bad decisions by the president, on issues ranging from free trade to military policy. In the piece entitled "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration," the author says that "many Trump appointees have vowed to do what we can to preserve our democratic institutions while thwarting Mr. Trump’s more misguided impulses until he is out of office." Describing Trump as unprincipled and "amoral," the author wrote: "Meetings with him veer off topic and off the rails, he engages in repetitive rants, and his impulsiveness results in half-baked, ill-informed and occasionally reckless decisions that have to be walked back." The piece compared Trump unfavorably to the late Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., described as a "lodestar for restoring honor to public life and our national dialogue." A livid Trump questioned whether the author is a legitimate administration official, but also demanded that the Times out him or her and suggested that the person should be investigated. "Does the so-called 'Senior Administration Official' really exist, or is it just the Failing New York Times with another phony source?" Trump tweeted Wednesday. "If the GUTLESS anonymous person does indeed exist, the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once!" White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said "the coward" who wrote the piece should step forward and resign, saying "he is not putting country first, but putting himself and his ego ahead of the will of the American people."<doc-sep>Two top administration officials — Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo — denied Thursday that they were behind a damning anonymous opinion article published in The New York Times a day earlier. Pence's office told NBC News it "definitively denies" that the vice president wrote the op-ed article — in which a senior administration official said the cause of the president's problems was his "amorality" and that officials were working to thwart initiatives that they believed could put the country at risk. Pence's communications director also tweeted a denial, along with criticism of The Times' decision to publish the piece. "The Vice President puts his name on his Op-Eds. The ⁦‪@nytimes‬⁩ should be ashamed and so should the person who wrote the false, illogical, and gutless op-ed," wrote Jarrod Agen, who also serves as Pence's deputy chief of staff. "Our office is above such amateur acts." The Vice President puts his name on his Op-Eds. The @nytimes should be ashamed and so should the person who wrote the false, illogical, and gutless op-ed. Our office is above such amateur acts. — Jarrod Agen (@VPComDir) September 6, 2018 The anonymous editorial published in the @nytimes is disgraceful. The author should resign. My thoughts from Orlando where we are on the road touting the accomplishments of @POTUS and this administration are below. We are not deterred. pic.twitter.com/8RzNzZras6 — Vice President Mike Pence (@VP) September 6, 2018 Later in the day, Pence tweeted that the op-ed article was "disgraceful" and he called on the author to resign. Online speculation about the author's identity quickly centered on Pence because of the author's use of the word “lodestar” — a word that Pence has used numerous times in public speeches. While on a state visit to India, Pompeo also denied writing the article, saying, "It's not mine." "It shouldn't surprise anyone that the New York Times, a liberal newspaper that has attacked this administration relentlessly, chose to print such a piece," Pompeo said. "And if that piece is true, if it’s accurate, if it’s actually — I think they described it as a senior administration official — they should not well have chosen to take a disgruntled, deceptive, bad actor’s word for anything and put it in their newspaper," he said. Later Thursday morning, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Dan Coats, the top intelligence official in the U.S., also issued denials. "Speculation that The New York Times op-ed was written by me or my Principal Deputy is patently false. We did not," Coats, the director of national intelligence, said in statement. "From the beginning of our tenure, we have insisted that the entire IC remain focused on our mission to provide the President and policymakers with the best intelligence possible." A spokesman for Nielsen said his boss was "focused on leading the men and women of DHS and protecting the homeland — not writing anonymous and false opinion pieces for the New York Times." "These types of political attacks are beneath the Secretary and the Department’s mission," the agency's press secretary, Tyler Q. Houlton, said in a statement. Additional denials — including from Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin — poured in throughout the day Thursday, while Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said in a tweet that people asking "for the identity of the anonymous coward" should, instead, direct their questions to The Times. In a message posted to Twitter, Sanders shared the phone number of the newspaper's opinion desk. "They are the only ones complicit in this deceitful act," she wrote. For those of you asking for the identity of the anonymous coward: pic.twitter.com/RpWYPHa6To — Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) September 6, 2018 First lady Melania Trump took the unusual step of criticizing the author, too. In a statement, she said, "Unidentified sources have become the majority of the voices people hear about in today's news." "People with no names are writing our nation's history. Words are important, and accusations can lead to severe consequences," she wrote. " If a person is bold enough to accuse people of negative actions, they have a responsibility to publicly stand by their words and people have the right to be able to defend themselves." "To the writer of the oped - you are not protecting this country, you are sabotaging it with your cowardly actions," the first lady added. The author of the article, which The Times identified only as a senior official in the Trump administration, wrote that "many of the senior officials in his own administration" are working against Trump from within "to frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations." The administration official also confirmed reports that there were once internal Cabinet discussions about removing Trump from office by invoking the 25th Amendment, but said in The Times that now "we will do what we can to steer the administration in the right direction until — one way or another — it's over." The Times explained in a note to readers why it published an anonymous op-ed article, saying it had "done so at the request of the author, a senior official in the Trump administration whose identity is known to us and whose job would be jeopardized by its disclosure." The article set off a firestorm of attacks from Trump himself, who called it "gutless" at a White House event Wednesday night before tweeting about it several times. On Thursday morning, former CIA Director John Brennan, a regular and fierce critic of Trump, warned that the publication of the op-ed article would add to the president's frustrations and likely create more conflict. "I do think things will get worse before they get better," he said. "A wounded lion is a very dangerous animal."<doc-sep>As many speculate over the identity of the anonymous alleged "senior official in the Trump administration" who authored a scathing New York Times op-ed about President Donald Trump, some are focusing on a one-word clue that points to Vice President Mike Pence as the culprit Did Mike Pence Write the Anonymous NYT Op-Ed Blasting Trump? This One Word Has People Suspicious Credit: CLEVELAND, OH - JULY 20: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump stands with Republican vice presidential candidate Mike Pence and acknowledge the crowd on the third day of the Republican National Convention on July 20, 2016 at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump received the number of votes needed to secure the party's nomination. An estimated 50,000 people are expected in Cleveland, including hundreds of protesters and members of the media. The four-day Republican National Convention kicked off on July 18. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) As many speculate over the identity of the anonymous alleged “senior official in the Trump administration” who authored a scathing New York Times op-ed about President Donald Trump, some are focusing on a one-word clue that points to Vice President Mike Pence as the culprit. In the essay, the author hails the late Arizona Sen. John McCain as “a lodestar for restoring honor to public life and our national dialogue.” Get push notifications with news, features and more. The archaic word — which Merriam-Webster defines as “a star that leads or guides” or a person who “serves as an inspiration, model, or guide” — happens to be one that Pence has used often, as evidenced by a compilation video making the rounds on Twitter. Pence’s communications director has taken the surprising step of openly shutting down the wide speculation that the vice president is behind the op-ed. “The Vice President puts his name on his Op-Eds,” Jarrod Agen tweeted. “The @nytimes should be ashamed and so should the person who wrote the false, illogical, and gutless op-ed. Our office is above such amateur acts.” But some on Twitter are not convinced. RELATED VIDEO: PEOPLE Writer Natasha Stoynoff Breaks Silence, Accuses Donald Trump of Sexual Attack The “lodestar” hashtag is trending after audio producer Dan Bloom explained his suspicions about Pence in a Twitter thread. Others believe the clue could be a red herring — or even a frame job.<doc-sep>
Vice President Pence denied being the senior administration official who wrote an anonymous New York Times op-ed criticizing President Donald Trump – following online speculation that a clue in the piece may have pointed to him. “The Vice President puts his name on his Op-Eds,” Pence’s chief of staff Jarrod Agen said in a tweet. “The @nytimes should be ashamed and so should the person who wrote the false, illogical, and gutless op-ed. Our office is above such amateur acts.” Speculation that Pence penned the op-ed — in which an unnamed senior administration official claimed to be a part of a group of conservatives inside the Trump Administration who are working against the President — spread across Twitter Wednesday because the writer used the word “lodestar” in reference to John McCain. People online quickly figured out that “lodestar” is a popular word for Pence – which he uses in both his writing and public statements. Others pointed out that the use of the word could be a deliberate red herring to direct attention away from the real author. The op-ed has prompted other administration officials to distance themselves, as well. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also denied writing the anonymous piece while speaking with reporters in New Delhi. “It’s not mine,” he said, adding that if the piece was written by a senior official, the Times “should not well have chosen to take a disgruntled, deceptive, bad actor’s word for anything.” Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats also said he was not behind the anonymous op-ed in a statement Thursday morning. “Speculation that The New York Times op-ed was written by me or my Principal Deputy is patently false,” Coats said. “We did not. From the beginning of our tenure, we have insisted that the entire IC remain focused on our mission to provide the President and policymakers with the best intelligence possible.” Trump called on the Times to reveal who wrote the op-ed in a tweet Wednesday, calling the author “GUTLESS.” Trump on Thursday morning attacked the media again while touting what he sees as his accomplishments. Write to Mahita Gajanan at mahita.gajanan@time.com.