Robert Hanssen: The FBI's Most Damaging Spy w/ Major Garrett
The Road to Now
Benjamin Sawyer
4.8 • 628 Ratings
🗓️ 7 July 2025
⏱️ 53 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
FBI agent Robert Hanssen was one of the most damaging spies in US history. From 1979 to 2001, Hanssen delivered some of the United States governments' most sensitive secrets to Soviet and Russian agents, who used them to not only undermine US national security, but to identify and execute individuals who were working with the FBI. And despite an awareness of spies working within the FBI, Hanssen managed to operate for more than two decades before finally getting caught.
In this episode we speak with CBS News' Major Garrett, whose new podcast Agent of Betrayal: The Double Life of Robert Hanssen, explores Hanssen's decision to spy on the US and how he managed to operate for so long without being caught. A thoroughly researched history with all the turns of a great true crime podcast, we think you'll enjoy Agent of Betrayal, available on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or anywhere else you get your podcasts.
This episode originally aired as episode 287 on October 16, 2023. This rebroadcast was edited by Ben Sawyer.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I'm Ben Sawyer and this is the road to now. |
| 0:11.6 | And road it is. |
| 0:13.3 | It's July. |
| 0:14.4 | And as longtime listeners of this show will know, me and Bob both take off. |
| 0:19.6 | I am in Long Beach, California, where I set up shop here |
| 0:22.6 | pretty much every July, grinding it out, doing some stand-up, hanging out with the family, |
| 0:28.0 | just enjoying this great weather out here. Bob is on the road with the Aivet Brothers. |
| 0:32.7 | You know, when we started this show years ago, it would be bizarre for me to say, hey, if you like this show but don't |
| 0:39.0 | know the Avert Brothers, because I think most of the core audience early on was Avert Brothers fans, |
| 0:43.8 | but God bless you all. We may be at a point now where you don't know that the Avid |
| 0:48.6 | brothers are playing at Red Rocks coming up. Three nights, July 11th, that's a Friday. That one sold out. Saturday, July |
| 0:56.5 | 12th and Sunday, July 13th. They got tickets available to those second two, probably not for long. |
| 1:02.8 | Go check out the Aivet brothers if you haven't. I love them. And you know, I don't think Bob listens to |
| 1:07.0 | these intros when he's not on them. I'm saying this honestly. Love those guys. |
| 1:16.5 | So I hope your summer's going well. Today, we are resharing an episode from 23 with Major Garrett. Now, you all know Major Garrett from our recent live show, but long before that, |
| 1:24.0 | and one of the reasons we thought of him was because he did this great podcast series, Agent of Betrayal, about Robert Hansen, this super spider in the Cold War. |
| 1:33.6 | And today, we are sharing that original conversation, Major's first appearance on the show. |
| 1:38.6 | Major Garrett, of course, is the well-known CBS News White House correspondent, but the series itself, man, it's so good. |
| 1:46.4 | The mind-boggling things, like tunneling under emissies, |
| 1:49.7 | all the cat and mouse games that were played during the Cold War, |
| 1:53.8 | they're all in the series. |
| 1:55.1 | Hope you guys enjoy it. |
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