Senate to vote on Trump's controversial pick for US intelligence chief

John Ratcliffe is a full-throated supporter of the president

(AP)

The US Senate looks set to confirm Texas congressman John Ratcliffe as the new director of national intelligence – despite several members' worries about his qualifications for the post and the veracity of claims he has made about his career.

When confirmed, Mr Ratcliffe – a full-throated supporter of the president – will follow a series of acting heads appointed by Mr Trump, who has ousted and fired multiple intelligence officials whom he has considered disloyal or beholden to what he calls the “deep state”.

Mr Ratcliffe was first nominated for the post a year ago, but the nomination was withdrawn after even some Senate Republicans questioned whether he had given a truthful account of his experience. Mr Trump blamed the “unfair” attention given to Mr Ratcliffe’s questionable CV on the “LameStream media”.

However, GOP senators warmed to Mr Ratcliffe after Trump unexpectedly nominated him a second time in February. Many of them had grown concerned about the turnover in the intelligence community and were at best lukewarm about the current acting director, Richard Grenell, whom Democrats openly derided as another example of an unqualified Trump ally appointed solely on the basis of his fealty to the president.

Mr Grenell has lately caused a stir by giving the Department of Justice a list of Obama-era officials involved in the “unmasking” of General Michael Flynn – an event that has come to form part of Mr Trump’s nebulous “Obamagate” conspiracy theory.

Most Republicans have praised Mr Ratcliffe since his second nomination, but Democrats have been skeptical that he will serve with the independence they say the job demands.

The top Democrat on the panel, Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, told Mr Ratcliffe at the hearing that he was deeply perturbed at Mr Trump’s firing of anyone in the intelligence leadership who dared speak truth to power.

After reading a list of names of those Mr Trump has dispatched, Mr Warner turned to his concerns about Mr Ratcliffe personally. “I don’t see what has changed since last summer,” he said, “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.”

Mr Ratcliffe worked to separate himself from the president, including by saying he believed Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election, a conclusion Trump has often resisted. He said he would communicate to Trump the intelligence community’s findings even if he knew Trump disagreed with them and might fire him.

Democrats were not convinced. But in the end, Mr Ratcliffe’s nomination was approved 8-7 in a closed committee hearing on Tuesday – a reported party line vote, with all Democrats voting against him.

With Associated Press