Jay Clayton, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, prepares to testify during a Senate intelligence committee hearing on his nomination for director of national intelligence, on Capitol Hill, Washington, July 15, 2026.
Ken Cedeno Afp | Getty Images
Jay Clayton, President Donald Trump’s nominee for director of national intelligence, refused to say whether Joe Biden won the 2020 election, said he did not know his predecessor Tulsi Gabbard took part in the raid on a Georgia election office earlier this year and defended calling New York Times reporters to a Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday.
Clayton, the former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission and current US attorney for the Southern District of New York, appeared before the Senate Intelligence Committee more than a month after Trump announced his nomination and weeks after the president abruptly canceled a confirmation hearing scheduled for June.
Although it appeared last month that Clayton would have a smooth path to confirmation, Democrats have challenged Clayton’s election views and tenure as U.S. attorney. He is likely to be confirmed in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., who spoke to MS NOW on Tuesday before Thursday night’s speech, where Trump is scheduled to launch foreign efforts to subvert the 2020 election, asked Clayton if he knew about Gabbard’s presence earlier this year during a raid on an election office in Fulton County, Georgia.
Clayton said he only learned of Gabbard’s widely reported involvement with Ossoff during a private meeting earlier this week.
“Is it appropriate for the director of national intelligence to oversee the execution of home search warrants at sensitive election centers? Yes or no?” Ossoff asked. Clayton didn’t answer.
“Your answers lack credibility. Your testimony lacks credibility,” Ossoff said.
Several times during the nearly two-hour hearing, Clayton refused to answer who won the 2020 election, instead saying: “I’m not a denialist. Joe Biden was endorsed.”
Ossoff, at one point, called Clayton’s answers “inappropriate.”
The committee is expected to vote on Clayton’s nomination next week. If the nomination is advanced by the committee, the full Senate will weigh it.
The process of appointing Clayton as DNI, a role that would have given him access to the country’s most sensitive secrets and authority over 18 intelligence agencies, has been marred by controversy, due to Trump’s actions and the temporary appointment of Bill Pulte, Trump’s close ally and director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Bipartisan lawmakers questioned whether Pulte — who from his FHFA position fielded mortgage-related questions for Trump opponents — was fit for the job.
“I can’t think of another incident in the history of this committee where the president sends a nominee, then in a united way, we say that we really want to move heaven and earth so that the nominee continues quickly because of the importance of the position, and then the president decides that the Senate is moving too fast by appointing himself, and holding the nominee,” said the Senate Chair, D on Wednesday. to hear.
The DNI job opened in May when then-director Gabbard announced plans to step down. Pulte took office later that month and has carried out Trump’s orders to fire dozens of senior intelligence officials.
On the morning of Clayton’s original hearing, Trump took to TruthSocial and ordered him not to appear, saying he was temporarily suspending his nomination. Trump said he declined in part because he wanted Congress to attach a controversial election bill — which would impose photo identification and proof of citizenship requirements for registration — to renewing an unrelated foreign surveillance law.
After Trump’s nomination of Pulte, negotiations over that foreign surveillance law, known as Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, fell apart. The plan ended in June, as Democrats opposed Pulte’s nomination to the post.
After Pulte’s interim appointment, Clayton’s support appeared to be widespread. But he was fired Wednesday by Democrats on the Senate panel.
Sen. Angus King, Maine, asked Clayton about a statement he made on CNBC about the California election, where he seemed to entertain the possibility of voter fraud.
“We’ve had a problem, a big problem with voting in America,” Clayton said during a June appearance on “Squawk Box.” “On the integrity side, we’re doing a terrible job, and the American people are right to question it.”
The king asked for clarification.
“That meant that the audit trail we have in our elections in many places is not the kind of auditor you would expect for something so important,” said Clayton.
Asked by King if voter fraud was a problem in American elections, Clayton said, “I don’t think we can say definitively that there is, or isn’t, until we have better procedures.”
Reps. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., and Kirsten Gillibrand, DN.Y., both pressed Clayton about subpoenas issued to New York Times reporters last week after they reported on security concerns related to the new Air Force One that was donated to Trump by Qatar.
Clayton issued subpoenas, which The New York Times said were delivered Friday, in some cases to the homes of the reporters in question. The journalists were ordered to appear before a grand jury on Wednesday to testify “regarding alleged violations of the criminal law.”
Clayton said he could not go into the details of the investigation.
“I must say that I am sure that the procedures we have in place to protect the First Amendment and to protect the freedom of the press, will not result in the intimidation of journalists,” said Clayton.
