President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the CIA, John Ratcliffe, promised the Senate Intelligence Committee that he and the agency would increase the focus on China during his confirmation hearing Wednesday.
Ratcliffe, a former Texas representative and director of national intelligence during Trump’s first administration, is expected to be confirmed to run the Central Intelligence Agency next week, once Trump’s second term begins.
WATCH LIVE: TRUMP CABINET NOMINEES PARADE THROUGH CAPITOL FOR SECOND DAY OF HEARINGS
There is a “need for the CIA to continue, and increase in intensity, its focus on the threats posed by China and its ruling Chinese Communist Party,” Ratcliffe told lawmakers. “As DNI, I dramatically increased the intelligence community’s resources devoted to China. I openly warned the American people that, from my unique vantage point as the official who saw more U.S. intelligence than anyone else, I assessed that China was far and away our top national security threat.”
“This is our once-in-a-generation challenge,” Ratcliffe added. “The intelligence is clear.”
The committee’s chairman, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), highlighted what he perceived as the CIA’s recent shortcomings during his opening remarks.
“In these dangerous times, our intelligence agencies haven’t anticipated major events or detected impending attacks in just the last few weeks,” Cotton said, referencing the Islamic State group-inspired attack in New Orleans on New Year’s Day, the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria, and the Hamas attack against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
“Suffice it to say we’re too often in the dark,” the Arkansas senator added. “While this goes with the entire intelligence community, the problem is especially acute at CIA, which remains, after all, the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA needs to get back to its roots but must overcome several challenges to do so.”
Ratcliffe was elected to Congress in 2014 and served until he resigned during his third term to serve as DNI. Trump initially announced his intention to nominate Ratcliffe to serve as DNI in 2019, but it was met with backlash from Democrats, and he withdrew the idea days later. The former and incoming president then decided to renominate him in 2020, and the Senate confirmed him in a party-line vote, 49-44.
The top Democrat on the committee, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), recognized that Ratcliffe has “an appreciation for the work done by [the] intelligence committee and, more specifically, the CIA.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The ranking member added that he’s “very concerned” about Trump’s continued “undeserved attacks upon the professional women and men of our intelligence agencies,” and he asked for Ratcliffe’s assurance that the “intelligence will represent the best judgment of the CIA, regardless of political implications or views.”
Warner was not the only Democrat to express skepticism toward Ratcliffe, and questioned his commitment to keep the agency apolitical, though several Democrats expressed an openness to working with him if he gets confirmed.
Ratcliffe referenced his opposition to the letter signed by 51 intelligence community officials claiming Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation in the lead up to the 2020 election, as evidence of his willingness to stand against popular opinion and narratives.
“In 2020, when a chairman of an intelligence committee misrepresented that a laptop owned by then candidate Biden’s son was somehow a Russian intelligence operation, and 51 former intelligence officials used the imprimatur of IC [intelligence community] authority to go along with that, I stood in the breach. I stood alone and told the American people the truth about that,” Ratcliffe said during his confirmation hearing.
Cotton said they will hold a committee vote on his nomination as soon as next Monday, before it would then go before the whole senate body, if it passes.
The CIA is one of 18 agencies that make up the intelligence community, which is overseen by the director of national intelligence. Trump picked Tulsi Gabbard to run the Office of the Director of National Intelligence this time, though her nomination is facing uncertainty despite the GOP’s control of the Senate.
