{"id":12780,"date":"2026-06-18T21:54:24","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T21:54:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/range\/intelligence-director-hearing-cancelled-as-trump-pushes-voter-restriction-bill\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T21:54:24","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T21:54:24","slug":"intelligence-director-hearing-cancelled-as-trump-pushes-voter-restriction-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/range\/intelligence-director-hearing-cancelled-as-trump-pushes-voter-restriction-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"Intelligence director hearing cancelled as Trump pushes voter-restriction bill"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Senate Intelligence Committee postponed a nomination hearing for Jay Clayton to serve as director of national intelligence hours after President Donald Trump declared the session would not go forward, the panel\u2019s chairman said.<\/p>\n

Early Wednesday morning, Trump said the hearing would be \u201ccanceled\u201d until the Senate could confirm the new U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, who would be Clayton\u2019s replacement. In a post, the president said he was derailing the process to press senators to pass his voter-restricting SAVE AMERICA Act.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s regrettable that the president has directed Jay Clayton not to appear at his confirmation hearing today,\u201d said Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., who chairs the intelligence committee. \u201cMr. Clayton is a patriot and a highly qualified nominee, as the president has said repeatedly. While today\u2019s hearing is now unfortunately postponed, I look forward to proceeding with his confirmation in the near future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Republicans were hoping to fast-track confirmation of Clayton to the position after Trump appointed Bill Pulte to serve as DNI in an acting capacity. Clayton has drawn support from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.<\/p>\n

Democrats warned that Pulte\u2019s role in the president\u2019s mortgage-fraud reviews last year could foreshadow an abuse of intelligence tools to target the president\u2019s political opponents, leading to the historic lapse of a key surveillance authority earlier this month.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Confirming Clayton would have helped reshore support from key Democrats for the surveillance power. But Trump also defended that the spying authority \u2014 Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act \u2014 should not pass without the concurrent passage of a controversial voter identification bill that doesn\u2019t have enough support in Congress.<\/p>\n

\u201cNational security cannot be governed by social media post,\u201d said Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the vice chairman of the high chamber\u2019s intelligence committee. \u201cThe president\u2019s 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.\u201d<\/p>\n

The postponement sets Pulte up to begin as acting DNI starting this Friday. Trump has previously said he wants Pulte to further shrink\u00a0the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and continue election integrity investigations launched by current spy chief Tulsi Gabbard.<\/p>\n

Gabbard is to depart soon. She announced the plans to do so weeks ago, citing her husband\u2019s cancer diagnosis.\u00a0\n\n<\/svg><\/p>\n<\/div>\n