President Trump today blew up the Senate’s plans to quickly take up the nomination of Jay Clayton to serve as director of national intelligence.
The Senate was speeding ahead on that nomination to avoid having Bill Pulte, the MAGA loyalist Trump had picked to serve as acting intelligence chief, step into that role. Democrats and some Republicans said that Pulte, the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, was completely unqualified given his total lack of national security experience. Democrats insisted that Trump and Republicans needed to dump Pulte before they would help reauthorize a lapsed surveillance tool, section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Trump derailed that compromise, announcing on social media that he had called off a Senate Intelligence Committee confirmation hearing for Clayton scheduled for this afternoon. Trump said that Pulte would be acting director — and he insisted that he will not approve the FISA renewal without the election reform bill that has stalled in the Senate. Trump also demanded that the Senate first confirm Jamie McDonald, his pick to succeed Clayton as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York.
Sen. Tom Cotton, the Republican chair of the Intelligence Committee, said in a post on X that the president had instructed Clayton not to appear at a confirmation hearing scheduled for this afternoon. Cotton called the move “regrettable.”
Sen. Mark Warner, the Democratic vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, slammed Trump’s move. “What we’re witnessing is an extraordinary display of dysfunction from a president who seems determined to turn America’s national security into a political bargaining chip,” Warner said in a statement. “National security cannot be governed by social media post. The president’s latest intervention only underscores a simple reality: the biggest obstacle to resolving these issues has not been Senate Democrats or Senate Republicans. It has been the chaos and confusion coming from the White House itself.”
When asked why Trump was linking his push for voter ID to his intelligence nominee, Senate Majority Leader John Thune reportedly answered: “Good question.”