Nomination of Clayton for Director of National Intelligence

Good morning. This hearing will come to order. I want to welcome all of you to today's hearing on the nomination of Mister J Clayton to be the Director of National Intelligence. Before we begin, uh, I would also like to recognize the devastating loss we all suffered over the weekend on behalf of this committee, pay tribute to our former colleague, Lindsey Graham. Though Lindsey didn't serve on the Intelligence Committee, As a former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he was a part of our extended family, and he was obviously a champion for intelligence officers, just as he was for our troops. He was a true partner on issues such as FISA, FBI, DOJ oversight. Lindsay ensured the intelligence community had the resources needed to confront our adversaries. Lindsay was a true patriot who led with courage, loyalty, and relentless optimism during his time both as an Airman in the Air Force and in the United States Congress. In remembrance of Senator Lindsey Graham's lifetime of service, I invite the members of this committee to honor our colleague and friend by living up to the example he set in carrying forward his love for God and for country. We also welcome his sister and new senator, Darlene, who we all had the occasion to meet yesterday, and who I know will carry forward his legacy in a way that would make him immensely proud, as he always was proud of his young sister. Today's hearing is an opportunity to consider Mr. Clayton's qualifications. So I'd like to welcome him and his wife, Gretchen, to the Senate Intelligence Committee. Mr. Clayton, thank you for once again answering the call to public service. To your family and loved ones, including those watching from home, thank you for your support during this process. I want to state for the record that Mr. Clayton has provided answers to our standard forty page committee questionnaire. He has answered in writing more than two hundred advanced questions for the record as well. He has completed his FBI background investigation. He has met with most members of this committee, and he has provided more than five years of tax returns. This is no small feat, but was helped in large part by the fact that this was his third time through the process. I want to thank all of those persons and organizations who worked to move his nomination at very fast speeds. That includes our committee staff, the staff at the office of the Director of National Intelligence, the FBI, the Office of Government Ethics, and the White House Counsel's Office. I'd also like to offer my prayers to outgoing Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard's husband, Abraham, as he battles cancer, and thank Miss Gabbard for her efforts to streamline the ODNI as she turns understandably to her husband's care. This committee is grateful for her decades of service to the country, both in uniform and as a civilian. And I also wanna take a moment to thank Bill Pulte for his leadership to date as the acting Director of National Intelligence. The additional steps he's taken to right size the office of the DNI will help Mister Clayton be successful on day one of assuming this position. Mister Pulte has been highly communicative and engaged with me and my staff during his tenure for which I am grateful. Mister Clayton, it's my understanding that you intend to finish Miss Gabber's work to return the ODNI to its original size scope and mission. I've long said that the right number of staff the ODNI would number in the dozens, maybe a couple hundreds at the maximum, but certainly not the thousands of recent years. Congress intended the ODNI to be a lean and efficient organization to keep bureaucratic intelligence agencies at bay. But some twenty years later, the ODNI has unfortunately become yet another bloated agency that incentivizes bureaucratic make work, as opposed to genuine intelligence work. Mister Clayton, given your many years as a seasoned professional in both government and private practice, I'm eager to hear how your experiences will inform your plans to return the ODNI to those routes. I look forward to working with you to provide any legislative relief that you deem necessary such as transferring centers or functions to other government agencies, because while many functions need that are needful occur at the ODNI, they don't necessarily need to be occurring there. Additionally, I'm interested in hearing about your efforts to advance America's national security and your current role as a United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. As US attorney, Mister Clayton has gone after some of the worst of the worst national security threats, including foreign enemies who put innocent Americans at risk and have American blood on their hands. For example, he's overseen the indictment of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, secured the guilty plea of Venezuelan General Hugo Carvajal, and overseen the prosecution of an Iran-backed terrorist connected to multiple attempted terror attacks in the United States. Though these are just a few high profile cases, let me state for the record that Mister Clayton has worked hand in glove with our intelligence agencies and counterterrorism personnel to lock up criminals who threaten our national security. I commend him and all those involved for this important work. I'm interested in hearing from the nominee how he plans to apply this experience as a leader of the intelligence community. Mister Clayton, in addition to streamlining the ODNI, on your foremost on your to-do list will be helping refocus the intelligence community on operations by being a vocal and uncompromising advocate for its resources. If confirmed, I'll expect you to make the case to the intelligence and appropriations committees for why the funding requests in a supplemental funding bill are so vital. As most of us know, the intelligence community operations are at an all-time high with great successes, while the Pentagon received money from the working families tax cut, the intelligence community did not. I'll say here publicly what I wrote to Acting Director Pulte and Director Ratcliffe last month. I do not want to see any more reprogramming requests that borrow from operational account to fund another. There are plenty of underperforming and under-executing programs across the intelligence community that can be a bill-payer for needful operations, until Congress can pass supplemental appropriations bills. Now, before I turn it over to the Vice Ch- Chairman, I'd like to put on the record that in all my experiences with Mr. Clayton, his reputation as someone who operated with morality, decency and integrity has proven to be true. The job Mr. Clayton has been nominated for today is not one which he saw but one which he has been gracious enough to take on. I'm confident that by the end of the day, my colleagues will join me in seeking to get Mister Clayton's nomination across the finish line. I now recognize the Vice-Chairman for his opening remarks.

Well, thank you Mister Chairman, let me just echo what you said at the beginning of this hearing in terms of um the great loss we all feel on both sides of the aisle of the passing of our friend Lindsey Graham and as we commented yesterday he was not on this committee but he sure as hell acted like he was on this committee on on many times um mr. clayton jay it's good to see you again and it was great to have the opportunity to meet your wife gretchen in the ante room um and i'm gonna start with where the where the chairman started um and i have addressed this before but the the process we've gone through to get you before this committee is really pretty remarkable i can't think of any other instance in the history of this committee where a president sends a nominee up and then in a bipartisan way we say we really wanna move heaven and earth to get this nominee moving through quickly because the importance of the position and then the president decided that senate was moving too fast on his own nominee and uh pulls that nominee for a while, pulls down the hearing, and in the meantime blows up the FISA reauthorization process, which is um um critically important. Now, I know you had nothing to do with that, and we're probably as surprised as many of us, so I guess congratulations about getting finally in front of this committee. Um, I also wanna thank you for your partnership uh when you were SEC chairman and when we worked on investments in human capital. Um but as i when i last talked to you this job is very different than anything i think you've done in your long career and i'll have certain expectations of how you would perform the duties of dni these are expectations i make clear to all ic principles throughout my time on this committee regardless of administration first and foremost as most know this position of dni was created after the events of nine eleven And as such, and Senator Collins had a lot large role in creating this position, it said the law requires the D and I have extensive national security qualifications. Um, because if you get this job, you're gonna have intimacy with all of the nation's top-ly closely guarded secrets. Now, I know you've served in some very distinguished positions, SEC Chairman, US Attorney for Southern District. I look forward to hearing how those positions will meet that qualification of extensive national security experience. Second, as I've mentioned, the D N I has literally access to all our nation's secrets, things that are limited only to the gang of eight, uh, here in Congress. And I will hope that you will treat this sensitive information with the kind of respect and security it deserves. As members know, one of my greatest concerns with President Trump's appointment of Mister Polity is acting D N I. is that mr. polte had no national security experience and if anything it would seem to be his one qualification he had a demonstrated record of releasing private confidential mortgage information so we could weaponize it for political purposes i can't think of a less qualified individual to be anywhere close to the dni's rule in fact there's already reporting about mister polity's plan to do what intelligence on elections some that's based on and how we might misuse some of that on some of our most sensitive uh sources and just to understand how mister polity and one of the reasons why i am anxious to get a per-rent dni and can end up figuring out what is appropriate or not appropriate since he's been in the job for only three weeks and again with no national security experience Our nation's security depends on our ability to protect secrets and protect the people who gather those secrets, whether it's allies, partners, or assets we have recruited. Carelessly carelessly handling that information ultimately makes our country less safe. Lastly, I urge you to stand strong in protecting the most sacred of the IC principles, speaking truth to power. This commitment to truth is literally carved stone at the cia s headquarters. It is fundamental to not only the functioning and credibility of the ic, but also to the security of the american people. We have seen what happens when policymakers are allowed to shade intelligence for political reasons. It results in endless wars, tens of billions of dollars in wasted taxpayer dollars, and literally thousands of dead americans. Unfortunately, we have seen repeated attempts by this administration to politicize the IC. From a senior administration official telling IC officers to change their assessment because he feared it would make the president look bad. That's the a- absolute epitome of undermining speaking truth to power. To the former DNI literally inserting herself into an active domestic law enforcement action in Fulton County and seizing voting machines in Puerto Rico. nothing within the gambit of the d n i it's about foreign intelligence and foreign interference and in fact recent report suggests that the ic s annual analytic objective survey where they go out to the whole ic community and say how do you think things are going um shows a substantial increase in the number of ic employees who say they are concerned about the intelligence analysis being undermined by political interference. Again, the opposite of why your role was created and the opposite of what the goals of the IC should be. I hope that should you be confirmed, you will make it clear that this kind of politicization has no place in the intelligence community. And I ask that you treat the thousands of IC career staff who will be under your charge with the kind of respect and dignity they deserve. They are brave women and women who have signed up to serve country and they never get the recognition um that our men and women in uniform get but they do so much to protect our nation and instead of the outset this is a very different job than any you've had in the past in some ways i believe it's more critical than being sec chair or us attorney because in many ways the ic is our first line of defense in terms of keeping our country safe in order to make sure we keep our country safe The IC must also maintain the trust and credibility with the American people, which means objective analysis, keeping itself free from politicization. I look forward to your answers. Congratulations again, and I yield back.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chairman. I now recognize Senator Rounds, who would like to say a few words uh about Mr. Clayton.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, um, today I have the privilege of introducing the honorable jay Clayton president trump's nominee to serve as the next director of national intelligence i first met jay through my role on the banking committee when he was nominated by president trump and confirmed by the senate to be chairman of the securities and exchange commission in twenty seventeen he's a consummate professional with a distinguished career in both the private and public sectors the senate previously confirmed him on a bipartisan basis to serve as the sec chair and i'd like to think we were proven correct in judging his character the first time around it's no surprise president trump would select him to serve in his cabinet the dni has to be a trusted unbiased voice to provide ongoing intelligence to the president i believe jay will do a great work in this role jay is an accomplished lawyer with decades of experience and he currently holds one of the most high profile and demanding posts in the department of justice as the US attorney for the southern district of New York. He made the most of his time in New York by prosecuting some of America's worst enemies and threats to our national security. Mohammad El-Siddiyah, the Iranian Iraqi national responsible for over a dozen terrorist attacks in Europe, and two attempted attacks on America. Nicolas Maduro, and other narco-terrorists. These efforts required extensive coordination with the intelligence community, and larger national security enterprise, including the Department of Justice, the Department of the Treasury, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. If confirmed, Jay's experience at the helm in New York will serve him well as DNI. Mister Clayton chaired the SEC through a period of significant uncertainty for financial markets, during the depths of the COVID-19 epidemic in twenty twenty. His success in leadership roles at the SEC and DOJ is strong evidence of his ability to be an effective coordinator as the director of national intelligence. Many of the most pressing national security threats we face today are cross-cutting issues that involve technology and economics and go beyond the IC's traditional focus on foreign military capabilities and foreign leadership intentions. Jay's time at the SEC and in the private sector has given him valuable experience with issues that the DNI faces on a daily basis. cyber threats from state and non-state actors, illicit finance, economic competition with China, and the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence by both our adversaries and our own intelligence community. He brings valuable insight into each of these areas that will serve him and our country well. Jay holds a TS SCI clearance and has worked in highly classified, compartmented environments, requiring discretion and security compliance. As a result, he knows firsthand the critical importance of section seven O two and FISA. His extensive experience working across agencies is a quality needed as DNI. He has a working relationship with CIA Director Ratcliffe that will make for a smooth transition into this leadership role. While Jane may not have served in the intelligence community, He has the right mix of practical experience working with the IC, including experience with the Justice Department and coordination with the Department of the Treasury. His professional background is important to the growing demands being placed upon the IC, related to technology and economic competition. Further, his diverse experience in the private sector, the SEC, and as a US Attorney in a very active district, give him the wealth of management, leadership, and organizational experience to succeed in coordinating at all the different equities or with all of the different equities that make up the intelligence community. In closing, I offer my strong endorsement for Mister Clayton to serve as the next Director of National Intelligence. Thank you, Mister Chairman.

Thank you, Senator Brown. Mister Clayton, before we move to your opening statement, I need to ask you st- five standard questions the committee poses to each nominee who

yes

two if confirmed you agree to send officials from your office to appear before the committee and designate a staff when invited

yes

three do you agree to provide documents or any other materials requested by the committee in order for it to carry out its oversight and legislative responsibilities

yes

four will you ensure that your office and your staff provide such material

Yes, I will.

Five. Do you agree to inform and fully brief, to the fullest extent possible, all members of this committee of intelligence activities and covert actions, rather than only the Chairman and the Vice-Chairman?

Yes.

Thank you very much. After our hearing today, it's my intention to convene a committee business meeting early next week, to vote on the nomination of Mister Clayton and report it to the Senate for a floor vote. Mister Clayton will now proceed to your opening statement. after which I will recognize members by seniority before the gavel and by arrival after the gavel for five minutes each. Mister Clayton, the floor is yours.

All right. Thank you, Chairman Cotton. Vice

You move the mike a little closer.

How's this? Okay. Thank you, Chairman Cotton, Vice Chairman Warner, and the distinguished members of the committee. I am honored to appear before you today as the nominee to be the Director of National Intelligence. I would like to thank President Trump for placing his continued trust and confidence in me. I am humbled by this nomination and grateful for the opportunity to continue serving our country. I also want to thank my wife, Gretchen, and our children for their support and their commitment to public service. I also thank the many women and men I have worked with at the SEC and the DOJ. together we have built great teams that have delivered for the american people. sorry rounds i thank you for those very kind words and for your commitment to the people of south dakota and our country i have been fortunate to serve in a broad range of leadership roles in both the public and private sectors each position has presented challenges and opportunities if confirmed i intend to approach the d n i roll in the same way i have approached these roles mission focused and team oriented taking on the challenges and seizing the opportunities the mission of the director of national intelligence is clear to ensure that the policymakers and institutions that the intelligence community serves especially the president our military leaders and congress receive the best possible intelligence in a timely objective, and independent manner. That mission and obligation will be front of mind every day. If confirmed, I will work to strengthen the coordination and communication between the intelligence community and the people we serve. I will focus on enhancing the trust of the American people in the ODNI, the intelligence community, and our federal government generally. I will have an open door and walk the halls policy. This has proven invaluable. I also look forward to engaging with this committee and the House Permanent Select Committee on intelligence frequently. I am confident that my experience has prepared me for this role, including my experience leading and improving large organizations. Large multifaceted organizations, like our intelligence community, work well when they have one, a commitment to the mission, two, clear strategic objectives that further that mission, and three, metrics that facilitate the assessment and improvement of their operations. I intend to work with the members of this committee to develop all three of those. A few specifics on my national security experience. As the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, I've gained signif- significant national security experience, including in matters involving far- foreign terrorist organizations, counter espionage, money laundering, bribery, and the abuse of our communications platforms to create and so distrust. We interact with US intelligence community and counterterrorism officials continuously on dozens of important national security matters. In addition, I've acted as the principal liaison with senior officials at Treasury, State and the Department of War on matters of national security. As Chairman of the SEC, I advise the intelligence community on various matters and directly confronted issues with national security implications, notably leading our cyber security and cyber cyber resilience for critical infrastructure in our financial services sector, combating Chinese influence on an exploitation of our markets, and importantly maintaining economic stability and confidence in our markets during the COVID-nineteen shutdowns. In the private sector, I also engaged in a broad range of national security matters. including with officials from the Federal Reserve, the Department of Justice and Congress. As an example, between my time at the SEC and my return to government at the Southern District, I testified before the House China Select Committee. Across these roles, I saw firsthand how judgment, discipline, integrity, and most importantly, effective communication and cooperation across different branches of government are essential to our national security. If confirmed, I will have those principles front of mind every day. Thank you for your time, and I look forward to your questions.

Thank you, Mister Clayton. You do indeed have a lot of experience leading large organizations, though I I hope by the end of your tenure and two and a half years at the DNI, you can add some experience leading small organizations, or at least a much smaller one. As I observed in my opening remarks and you mentioned in yours, in your current position as the US Attorney for S- Southern District of New York, you've taken part in a number of national security related investigations, including the prosecution of terrorists, narco-traffickers and others who wish to do harm to the United States and our citizens. I think it's probably important for many viewers to know that the Southern District may be the number one national security related US Attorney's office in the country. can you speak to your interaction specifically with the intelligence community as part of these investigations and how critical intelligence community collection was for informing the evidence you obtained to pursue convictions in these cases

thank you uh short answer is extremely critical and in the examples that you mentioned the examples that senator rounds mentioned whether it's maduro and carvajal um whether it's al-sadi the um uh i'll just say multifaceted terrorists who we've recently captured um and and our drug interdiction efforts combating cartels and the flow of deadly drugs the intelligence community is essential to our prosecutions in all of those cases and if if i may it's the only game in town the united states intelligence community combating those global threats is essential not just for the us But, as was mentioned in Senator Round's remarks, keeping our European colleagues safe as well.

Thank you. You also mentioned, uh, your time at the SEC. Now, in, in my neck of the woods, that's the country's best football conference. But here we're talking about the Securities and Exchange Commission. I think most observers would think, well, you know, that's for the stock markets and a Wall Street lawyer goes in and hopefully gets fees down and markets do well and combats fraud and maybe tackles new issues like cryptocurrency. Um, but I think some viewers would be surprised at the amount of national security related uh matters you had to confront at the SEC as well. Could you just go into a little bit more detail on that front too?

Sure. Starting starting at the top, um, national security and economic security are synonymous. National security and market function and market integrity are synonymous. Our our financial infrastructure is essential to our security as a nation. Going beyond that, understanding the economic implications of actions, um, and the likely knock-on effects is a big part of what I believe the intelligence community should be providing to the consumers of information. Understanding the economic consequences of actions, um, is an and it's an essential part of intelligence, and it's something that I engaged in frequently at the SEC.

A and while uh the office of the director of national intelligence was set up in the aftermath of the nine eleven attacks and the context of wars in the middle east, um, isn't that particularly true, uh, as we think about um our struggle for mastery with China and also checking Russian aggression around the world, that e- economic matters um are vitally important when we're facing traditional nation-state actors like Russia and China.

Sen- Senator Cotton, Chair Cotton, I I could not agree more that our adversaries not only look at kinetic um and other what i would call traditional ways to harm americans they look at economic ways to harm americans

thank you the vice chairman uh alluded to an address the president will apparently be giving tomorrow night um that may or or may not be based on some kind of intelligence um that's gonna be declassified to what degree have any of you been involved in the process for what may be discussed by the president tomorrow night

Um, I'm I'm not involved in in that.

Because you're not currently the Director of National Intelligence.

Cuz I'm currently not the Director of National Intelligence.

And in fact, to be involved would uh, violate a core principle which is you take no actions that would presume your confirmation.

That I couldn't have said it better.

Thank you for helping me establish that fact. The Vice Chairman.

Thank you, Mister Chairman. Um, as I said repeatedly, uh, if you're confirmed you gotta make sure that you speak truth to power

mmm

and that means even if the truth is not the preferred narrative that somebody wants to hear so let me just ask you a should be a simple question do you deny that joe biden won the twenty twenty election

uh senator i'm not i'm not in election denier joe joe biden was certified as the president of the united states

election denial is is something we cannot have um so i will take that as you do not deny that joe biden won the twenty twenty election

yeah yeah i'm i'm not i'm not i think let me just be clear we we have substantial work to do and i've made it in improving our electoral processes it's part of national security um and i i feel strongly about that

one of the things that again this will come around perhaps to what's happening tomorrow night as well um classified information is critical we if we violate classified information that loses us allies it makes us less strong i fear that certain countries already are not sharing as much information with us because of some of the the things that have happened so let me ask you some straight forward questions if confirmed you commit to protecting all classified information in accordance with established rules and procedures. Yes. If confirmed, you commit to following established processes and procedures when it comes to declassifying information. Yes. And that will then lead to the next, because if you're gonna follow official purposes, you cannot declassify information for political purposes. We promise that you will not do that.

senator i i promise that my de-classification exercises will be consistent with the role and i believe that there are a number of protections in place across the intelligence community to ensure that intelligence is not used for political purposes and i intend to adhere to those

well that that is you know in in many ways at least for me that is the nub of of this hearing

in in in in preparing for this hearing i have analyzed the

you know

procedures that in that are in place for declassification and other um actions that you would take as the director of national intelligence and i look forward to consulting with the people inside the intelligence community and at the odni to insure that we adhere to those principles

it's critically critically important because again we may see some of this tomorrow night or not but we go around those established procedures we could burn sources and methods we could lose allies it is the ramifications are so grave and it has been treated in such a cavalier way that it's really um extraordinary and upsetting to upsetting to me along with classified information comes the analytic tool one of the things that i pointed out in the recent uh um i c serve annual survey the number of i c analysts that are concerned that their work may be threatened by uh politicization or if you don't reach the right conclusion that completely undermines the basis of what the intelligence community is set up with so if confirmed you commit that the decisions in analysis will remain free from political pressure and conspiracy theories

yeah senator i the the role is to ensure that you the president in particular the members of the cabinet receive the best possible intelligence product available and i and i do commit to do that and and i do commit to do that

yeah if you could bring it the whole box a little closer might be

sorry i need a space for the papers but uh

um i can't stress enough you know if the ic workforce feels they're gonna get political blowback, or get fired, which we have seen, because they reach a conclusion that may not be what certain folks in the administration wanna hear, that undermines the whole work of

Mm-hmm.

the whole community.

Now, if I could jump in on that, and I and I wanna say that my experience at the sec, my experience at the doj, is that the people who have worked for me have great confidence that they can speak to me. in a candid and um free free from any worry that what they say to me in their professional capacity is gonna result in any kind of um disagree i would say any any kind of friction beyond the normal toing and froing that you have in any organization

yeah i will say let me add mike a comment too center round said in working with you at the sec i found that was how you operated and particularly in taking on certain issues that not not have been politically popular but this is this is such a different role and i and i so am so concerned that you that whoever ends up in this role is gonna be under a set of pressures that may be unprecedented and we're gonna need somebody extraordinarily strong i come to my last set of questions and that is around election integrity.

Mm-hmm.

Uh this job was set up to look at foreign interference in in our election. So it was more than stunning to me when the former

Mm-hmm.

director director Gabert showed up at a domestic I believe political interference activities in Fulton County um were coming into election season. I wanna make sure you g- are on the record if confirmed you will commit you will not interfere with or comment inappropriately on us elections

so you you outlined the role um correctly the role is to deal with foreign interference in us elections which is something i'm gravely concerned about but that's the role

and finally we cannot have the dni trying to put it his or her hands on the scales in terms of tipping the outcome of any American election. Will you commit to not

Right, but the the the the the the role of the intelligence community is to provide information,

put those hands on the scales?

not to engage in policy or or those things. So, yes.

Thank you. I yield back.

Thank you. I I agree that the role is very different, but that I think that's true of most government roles. Um, and we never quite know how people are performing them and some of us have been very satisfied with nominees we've confirmed in both parties and some have been dissatisfied but you know look at our former chairman marco rubio being a senator i think we can all agree is very different from being the secretary of state or being the national security advisor and he's pitching in their perfect game in those roles if you ask me uh but you can't reason by analogy you've been a wall street lawyer for a long time how how long you been a lawyer

um goodness uh thirty six years thirty three three years

and and so you're governed by attorney-client privilege, that's not classified material, but it is require you as a ethical obligation. Have you ever had any issue in handing attorney-client material?

No.

And the material you're handling in Wall Street, I mean, you're talking about market moving material,

It's actually just bil billions and probably an aggregate trillions of

millions or billions of dollars.

dollars of information that you have to be very careful not to allow to slip.

Or very sensitive personal information about clients as well. And no issues ever in the past dealing with those.

None.

Thank you. Senator Collins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome, Mr. Clayton. Mr. Clayton, I wanna give you a little bit of history of the ODNI. I was a co-author of the legislation that created the Director of National Intelligence. along with Senator Joe Liberman, Congresswoman Jane Harmon, and Congressman uh Pete Hoekstra in the house. And it came about following hearings that we had and extensive analysis of a failure of the more than eighteen intelligence agencies to share vital information. information that perhaps could have allowed the dots to be connected and the horrific terrorist attack of nine eleven to have been discovered and deterred. I'll never forget a conversation that I had with secretary of state, Colin Powell. He said our intelligence community needed an empowered quarterback to make sure that there was sharing of information and a collective, collaborative approach to intelligence. Instead, what we had was a very siloed approach. And that's why we worked so hard to draft the terrorist prevention and Intelligence Reform Act that created the office of the Director of National Intelligence and the NCTC, the National Counterterrorism Council, which would bring agencies together. So, I understand that ODNI has grown far bigger than we ever would have uh envisioned when we wrote that law. But I am deeply disturbed that some administration officials, and indeed some senators, have called for not just a reduction in the size of ODNI, but that we abolish it altogether. There remains a critical purpose and mission for ODNI to lead and manage the eighteen separate intelligence agencies with worldwide operations that include space, cyber, and human intelligence domains. Do you commit to maintaining the vital role of ODNI and its NCTC?

Um, the short answer, and I and then I'd like to elaborate is yes, I do. And having seen this from the outside now um in my roles and also preparing to hopefully take on this role if we didn't have this role we'd have to invent it because there needs to be a focal point for coordination across the other seventeen intelligence agencies uh there needs to be a a place of oversight um um a place to resolve conflict uh i look at at it as a board of directors roles And to the extent that the ODNI has gotten into operations or started to play the roles of some of those other agencies, it probably should pull back. Because it's, it's difficult to be both operations and oversight, but I think an oversight role is important.

Thank you. The second issue I want to bring up with you is the anomalous health incidents, uh, also known as Havana syndrome, that have occurred since twenty sixteen and caused in some cases career-ending disabilities for our intelligence, our defense, our State Department employees. The intelligence community initially took these attacks and care for victims seriously. However, for various reasons, this quickly seemed to turn into a very dismissive attitude throughout the federal government with little forward progress. This led Senator Gillibrand and I to co-author the Havana Act of twenty twenty one to support the victims who are not receiving care nor compensation. I have been frustrated over the past few years across both the Biden administration and the Trump administration. by the excuses provided and misinterpretations of ah i attacks and the slow implementation of senator gillibrand's and my bill last week tulsi gabbert rescinded two previous ah ah i intelligence community assessments and started to reassess both previous and new intelligence related to hh ahis. It's critical that we know about possible foreign weapon capabilities and how to keep our hard-working personnel, who are stationed in dangerous parts of the world, safe from these dangerous attacks. But forward movement, remains very slow. The DINI confirms, it's your job to confirm that intelligence is subjective, timely, and independent of political considerations and based on all available sources. So, with recent efforts to re-energize the research, on the causes and attribution of these devastating attacks on our personnel. Do you plan to continue these efforts?

Well, I'm not I'm not privy, but I I certainly plan to engage with you and Senator Gillibrand on this issue and I'm happy to do so.

I look forward to future discussions. There's a lot of history here.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Collins. uh, no stronger leader on national security, not just on this committee, but your work on the HISGAC committee and especially the appropriations committee, like our friend Lindsey Graham, the troops and intelligence officers, have no better friends than Senator Collins. Thank you for your work. Thanks. Thank you. Senator Wyden.

Thank you, uh, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Clayton, according to the press reports, the FBI director spent eight hours last Friday at the White House investigating journalists. My view is this is a flagrant attack journalists in the first amendment under the direction apparently of the trump administration when were you directed to issue subpoenas to the journalists and by whom

um senator i i believe you're referring to um the reporting around the subpoenas relating to

yeah the the subpoenas you signed

the subpoenas that i signed um those subpoenas are in connection with an ongoing national security investigation i'm happy to talk to you and this committee about our approach to the first amendment and our efforts in all cases um to limit to the greatest extent possible any intrusion into the operation of the free press i'm i'm absolutely committed to and respect our first amendment and the role of the press

so let me ask you this it's not even clear that the subpoenas that you signed follow the administration's policy which requires the government to first make all reasonable attempts to obtain information from other sources what specific actions did you take before you signed the subpoenas

uh uh i can tell you that in all of these cases we and not just one person and this is the way i operate i i i operate by asking my team what do you think any action in this regard you can be assured that it was a consultative exercise with the career prosecutors in my office

so that's what you did beforehand to satisfy yourself that this was important to do to send these journalists a subpoena and go to their house

to to to issue the subpoenas um but i let me say that this is i i don't wanna get into this in in too great a detail because it's inappropriate

i don't wanna get into details i just wanna find out what went on

we we followed the processes that were required to follow

ok let me go to the question of elections you've claimed in the past that vote by mail is tainted and i haven't seen any evidence of this these are your exact quotations you talk about you know dishonesty in uh in mail-in uh voting and at one point you talked specifically about a group that was um doing it i think it would be very helpful to get a sense of who you're talking about uh you said and i quote one group

do you

is using mail-in voting dishonestly so you basically said you got a group out there who are election bandits who we talking about

no i'd i i would like to see where you're pulling those quotes from because i've been i've been very careful in my words on this i've been very careful look we

your words

election election i i'd like to see the whole the whole passage

i'll send you the material but

yeah no i'll be and i'm happy to i'm happy to answer but but let me let me tell you that we we should be there are two parts

please

to this one is access which is extremely important access to the ballot is something that i know this body many people have worked hard for years and years the other one is integrity i'm a big believer that we can have better access than we've ever had before and better integrity than we've ever had before