John Ratcliffe will lead the Central Intelligence Agency under President Donald Trump after the Senate confirmed him to the position by a 74-25 vote Thursday.
Twenty Democrats voted alongside their Republican counterparts to confirm Ratcliffe. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., did not vote.
Ratcliffe, a former U.S. congressman from Texas, served as director of national intelligence during the last year of Trump’s first term. As CIA director, Ratcliffe will lead an agency that has long been vilified by Trump, and he could face pressure from the White House to wield intelligence against the president’s opponents.
His hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee in January was far less rancorous than those of several other Trump Cabinet picks. Ratcliffe said he intends to focus on countering the threat from the Chinese government and committed to reinvestigating “Havana syndrome,” a mysterious, potentially psychogenic illness that has been reported among intelligence officers and diplomats.








