WASHINGTON — The Senate Intelligence Committee convened Tuesday — at a distance — to vet Rep. John Ratcliffe, the Texas Republican whom President Donald Trump has nominated for the second time as director of national intelligence.
Trump first said he would nominate Ratcliffe to lead the nation’s intelligence community in July. But the president withdrew his name less than a week later amid reports that he had misrepresented his anti-terrorism experience as a federal prosecutor in a largely rural area of Texas.
Trump said in February that he planned to nominate Ratcliffe despite the earlier controversy.
If Ratcliffe is confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate, which appears likely, the president will gain an aggressive loyalist to oversee the nation’s 17 intelligence agencies. Trump previously forced out Dan Coats, his first national intelligence director, after public clashes over intelligence priorities and assessments.
Ratcliffe would replace Richard Grenell, who has held the post on an acting basis and is simultaneously serving as U.S. ambassador to Germany.
Grenell has no background in intelligence and has earned a reputation as a fierce partisan. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told Ratcliffe that some view his “main qualification for this post is you are not Ambassador Grenell.”
“I don’t see what has changed since last summer when the president decided not to proceed with your nomination over concerns about your inexperience, partisanship and past statements that seemed to embellish your record,” he said.
Ratcliffe promised in his opening statement that politics would not affect his analysis of national security threats.
“The intelligence I will provide, if confirmed, will not be impacted or altered as a result of outside influence,” he said.
Because of the coronavirus crisis, Tuesday’s hearing is being held under social-distancing guidelines. Senators were asked to watch from their offices and only come to the committee room to question Ratcliffe. The nominee sat on the opposite side of the room from senators.
Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., the committee chair, wore his mask around his neck as he made opening remarks. He said the next director of national intelligence faced special challenges identifying threats to national security during the pandemic.
“Countries around the world have locked down,” he said. “But those threats have not stopped.”
An Illinois native, Ratcliffe served eight years as mayor of Heath, Texas, a small town east of Dallas. In 2007, President George W. Bush named him acting U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Texas, a post he held for a year before returning to private practice.
Ratcliffe joined the House Intelligence Committee after being elected to Congress in 2014, and rose to prominence as a sharp critic of the Russia investigation after Trump was elected. He later became one of Trump’s most outspoken defenders during the House impeachment proceedings last fall.
After Trump sought to name Ratcliffe as spy chief last summer, news reports highlighted discrepancies in his career.
His campaign website said that, as a federal prosecutor he “personally managed dozens of international and domestic terrorism investigations involving some of the nation’s most sensitive security matters” and “put terrorists in prison.” Records did not support those claims.
Trump has repeatedly battled the nation’s intelligence leaders, sometimes dismissing their input or accusing them of trying to undermine his presidency. Ratcliffe is now poised to play a central role in some of the country’s most critical issues.
Intelligence agencies are examining whether the coronavirus originated in a Chinese laboratory, a claim that could escalate fraught tensions between Washington and Beijing.
Trump recently said he’s seen evidence that a government lab in Wuhan was the source, but neither he nor national security officials have provided any evidence. U.S. scientists have largely discounted that claim.
Ratcliffe told the committee that he would continue examining where the coronavirus came from.
“The intelligence community will be laser focused on getting all of the answers that we can regarding how this happened,” he said.
Trump is also awaiting a review, led by the U.S. attorney in Connecticut, of the now-closed Russia investigation. It will include scrutiny of the intelligence assessments that determined Moscow sought to help Trump win in 2016, which the president has always denied.
The Senate Intelligence Committee recently released a report supporting those intelligence assessments, however.
Ratcliffe dodged the question when asked whether he agreed, apart from confirming that Russia meddled in the election.
“They have a goal of sowing discord, and they have been successful in sowing discord,” he said.
———
©2020 Los Angeles Times
Visit the Los Angeles Times at www.latimes.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.