Director of National Intelligence

Jay Clayton

Independent · New York

Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission from 2017 to 2020 and U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2025 to 2026. Spent more than twenty years at the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell. Confirmed 51–47 and sworn in on August 3, 2026, succeeding Tulsi Gabbard, who stepped down in June 2026.

Record

A securities lawyer and prosecutor rather than a career intelligence official. Confirmed on a near-party-line vote after declining at his hearing to state directly that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. Oversees the sixteen intelligence agencies.

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