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Clayton Testifies at His Senate Intelligence Confirmation Hearing, Jul. 15, 2026

July 15, 2026 · C-SPAN · 2:32:21

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What happened

Jay Clayton appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on July 15, 2026, for the confirmation hearing on his nomination to be Director of National Intelligence, carried in full by C-SPAN. The hearing had originally been scheduled three weeks earlier; President Trump forced the delay of the original hearing, according to PBS NewsHour’s description of the session, while Bill Pulte served as acting director following Tulsi Gabbard’s resignation.

Senator Mike Rounds introduced the nominee, calling Clayton “a consummate professional with a distinguished career in both the private and public sectors” and noting the Senate had previously confirmed him on a bipartisan basis as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to Rounds’ office. Rounds said Clayton’s SEC and private-sector work had given him experience with “cyber threats from state and non-state actors, illicit finance, economic competition with China, and the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence.” Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, in his opening statement, cited Clayton’s record as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York — overseeing the indictment of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, the guilty plea of Venezuelan general Hugo Carvajal, and the prosecution of an Iran-backed terrorist — and said Clayton had “worked hand in glove with our intelligence agencies and counterterrorism personnel,” according to Cotton’s office.

The hearing’s sharpest exchanges concerned the 2020 election and Clayton’s authorization, as U.S. Attorney, of subpoenas for New York Times reporters who had reported on security issues with the updated Air Force One aircraft donated by Qatar, as C-SPAN’s record of the hearing summarized the topics. Pressed by Senator Ron Wyden on the subpoenas, Clayton said, “I’m absolutely committed to and respect our First Amendment,” according to C-SPAN. When Senator Mark Warner asked whether Joe Biden won the 2020 election, Clayton answered, “I’m not an election denier,” adding that Biden was “certified” as president; asked by Senator Mark Kelly why Biden was certified, Clayton said Biden received the most electoral votes, according to C-SPAN’s record. Senator Jon Ossoff pressed further — “Isn’t it humiliating to be unable to answer this question?” — and Clayton replied, “I’m not going to engage in the theater,” according to C-SPAN. Senator Angus King asked Clayton to share any evidence of voter fraud significant enough to change an election result, and Clayton said of whether a voter fraud problem exists: “I don’t think we can say definitively whether there is or is not until we have better processes,” as Nextgov reported from the hearing. On cybersecurity, Clayton committed to assessing whether the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s cyber and foreign-influence components, downsized under Gabbard, should be resourced again, according to Nextgov’s report.

On the substance of the job, Clayton told Senator Kelly that the top threats facing the United States include terrorism, drug trafficking and cartels, and traditional adversaries including Russia, China, and Iran, and that his SEC experience would let him be “extremely helpful” in understanding the economic strategies of well-funded threat actors, as hearing summaries reported. He described artificial intelligence as a “game changer” presenting both opportunity and threat, as The Columbian reported. Asked by Senator James Lankford how he would judge whether ODNI is the right size, Clayton answered with a board-of-directors analogy — the office’s role is “oversight and integration, not operations,” and “one thing you don’t want to do as a member of a board of directors… is get into the day-to-day of management. You lose perspective,” according to Lankford’s office.

Criticism was part of the record: Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said the committee was “deeply concerned” about the subpoena process, and Clayton answered, “I am comfortable with where we are, and I’m comfortable with how we are proceeding from here,” as ABC Audio reported. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer later called Clayton’s hearing performance “abysmal,” according to C-SPAN’s record of the Democratic leadership’s remarks. The Senate confirmed Clayton on July 28, 2026, by a vote of 51–47, according to Reuters, and he was sworn in as the ninth Director of National Intelligence on August 3, 2026.

Why it matters

This hearing is the founding document of Clayton’s directorship: the commitments he stated here — a mission-first review of ODNI’s size and structure, an assessment of its downsized cyber and foreign-influence components, a First Amendment commitment given under pressure over the reporter subpoenas, and a threat picture led by terrorism, cartels, and the Russia-China-Iran axis — are the benchmarks his tenure, conducted largely out of public view, is measured against on this site. His answers on the 2020 election also made this the most contested cabinet-level confirmation of 2026, carried on this page in both directions as the record stands.

Scoreboard watch

This is a candidate item for the weekly scoreboard: Clayton’s July 15, 2026 confirmation commitments — assessing whether ODNI’s cyber and foreign-influence components should be resourced again, a mission-first right-sizing review of ODNI as an oversight-and-integration body rather than an operational one, and his stated First Amendment commitment — each as stated at the hearing, to be checked against his conduct in office.

Sources: Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, confirmation hearing on the nomination of Jay Clayton to be Director of National Intelligence, July 15, 2026 (full hearing as carried by C-SPAN, embedded above; PBS NewsHour also carried the hearing live; hearing record as summarized by C-SPAN, event 444837); Senator Rounds’ introduction, rounds.senate.gov, July 15, 2026; Senator Cotton’s opening statement, cotton.senate.gov; Senator Lankford’s questioning, lankford.senate.gov; Nextgov, July 2026, and ABC Audio, July 2026, on the hearing; Reuters, July 28, 2026, on the 51–47 confirmation vote. All figures and characterizations as stated by Mr. Clayton and committee members at the hearing.