CNN's Alayna Treene could barely contain her surprise Thursday when Donald Trump reversed course on his intelligence chief pick just hours after FISA died in the House.
Trump announced he was nominating former SEC chairman Jay Clayton as the permanent director of national intelligence on Truth Social, hours after a House vote to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act failed 198-218. The program is set to expire Friday — though intelligence agencies may continue operating under a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court recertification through March 2027.
The whiplash was stunning: days earlier, Trump told House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) in a meeting that he would not give in on acting DNI Bill Pulte. The next morning, he posted that Pulte would begin on June 19.
"There's no other way to say this — this is a capitulation," Treene said live from the White House.
Treene explained that the backlash against Pulte — a housing official with zero intelligence background — had been ferocious and bipartisan. Trump had installed him, she reported, with a short-term agenda: shrink the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, purge perceived disloyalists, and dig into documents related to the 2020 election.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) called for the Pulte appointment to be "reversed immediately," saying Trump had "tossed a hand grenade into those sensitive negotiations" over FISA reauthorization. Democrats drew a hard line: no new DNI, no FISA votes.
Pulte spent nine days as Trump's designee — his scheduled start date was still a week away when Clayton's nomination landed.
Clayton, who chaired the SEC during Trump's first term and currently serves as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, is a credentialed and confirmable pick — the kind Democrats might accept to revive FISA. Trump's Truth Social post did not mention Pulte.
