The Senate voted on Tuesday to confirm Jay Clayton as the next head of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence 51-47, with no Democrats voting to support his nomination.
Clayton is currently the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and was previously the chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission. He will take over the role from Acting DNI Director Bill Pulte, who has been criticized by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle for his lack of intelligence experience.
Although Democrats did not back Clayton after he refused to say that Joe Biden won the 2020 election during his Senate confirmation hearing two weeks ago, his nomination is considered somewhat of a win for the caucus, who have repeatedly expressed concerns about Pulte’s ability and background.
Pulte has overseen several rounds of layoffs at the department, including as recently as Tuesday, since he took over a month ago, and he’s seen as a deeply partisan figure with virtually no experience in intelligence matters. Democrats say that as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Pulte was central to the administration’s use of mortgage records in targeted political investigations.
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“It’ll be a vast improvement,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-Virginia), the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence committee, said Monday of Clayton while still voting against him. “I hope he will become the guy I used to work with, and it’s a hugely important position.”
In June, Democrats worked with Senate Republican leadership to fast-track Clayton’s nomination to force Pulte out of the role quickly. The plan was derailed after President Donald Trump instructed his pick not to attend the confirmation hearing.
Despite Democrats’ reservations, Warner acknowledged Clayton’s experience with intelligence matters as a prosecutor following his confirmation hearing. “Mr. Clayton said what I wanted to hear in terms of the importance of classification of information and speaking truth to power,” Warner said.
What’s still unclear is if Clayton’s swearing in will be the missing piece to unlock the Democratic votes to reauthorize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which has been shut down since mid-June over their concerns about Pulte’s leadership.
Though Warner told reporters that there’s less of a rush to renew FISA than Democrats had initially thought, several senators on the intelligence panel told NOTUS on Monday that they’re ready to vote to reauthorize the spy powers act, which comprises more than 60% of the president’s daily briefing, as soon as Clayton is installed.
Still, with the House out of town for August recess and a laundry list of items left for Senate Majority Leader John Thune to accomplish before the upper chamber heads home, the Senate is not likely to take a vote on Section 702 until September.
“We still have authorities to do some of these things,” Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Arizona), who also serves on the intelligence committee, said. “But over time, the chance that something slips through the cracks that we would have caught with full FISA, especially 702, the likelihood that something bad happens increases.”
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