Clayton was confirmed July 28 by a 51-47 vote after months of turmoil around the Office of Director of National Intelligence.
DNI nominee refuses to answer 2020 election question
Director of National Intelligence nominee Jay Clayton refused to answer Sen. Jon Ossoff’s question asking who won the 2020 election.
The Senate confirmed U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton as director of national intelligence in a party-line vote, approving President Donald Trump’s pick to permanently lead the nation’s spy agencies after backlash to his interim choice.
Clayton was confirmed July 28 by a 51-47 vote after months of turmoil around the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
“Jay is outstanding in every way, and will do a spectacular job as Director!” Trump wrote on social media after the vote.
Tulsi Gabbard announced in May that she was resigning as DNI and Trump tapped housing official Bill Pulte to lead the office on an interim basis, elevating a close ally with no experience in intelligence operations. Pulte faced bipartisan criticism of his qualifications for the intelligence job.
While Clayton also has has relatively few national security credentials compared to his DNI predecessors, he oversees the Justice Department’s office in the Southern District of New York, which handles cases related to national security threats and is DOJ’s largest field office with more than 220 prosecutors. He is also a former chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Clayton attracted attention during his confirmation hearing for refusing to say who won the 2020 election. Trump lost the 2020 race to former President Joe Biden but has continued to push unfounded claims that the election was stolen.
“I’m not going to engage in the theatre,” Clayton said when pressed by Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Georgia, on 2020.
Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat who serves as vice chair of the Intelligence Committee, said in a news release after Clayton’s confirmation that he was initially “encouraged” by his nomination but “came away from his confirmation process with serious reservations about whether he would be willing to stand up to political pressure when it matters most.”
“Now that he has been confirmed, I sincerely hope he proves those concerns unfounded, because the Intelligence Community deserves steadier leadership than it has received in recent months,” Warner added.
Clayton will take over an office that Pulte has been downsizing. The acting DNI announced multiple rounds of layoffs on social media, writing on July 28 that the office had been cut by 30%.
Consternation over Pulte’s appointment caused the House of Representatives on June 11 to block the renewal of a key government surveillance law – Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA.
Contributing: Zachary Schermele, Josh Meyer