What are you hearing . This development with the complaint coming out being declassified and reading it is different than what weve seen already. The transcript was yesterday of the phone call. The transcript as the white house describes it. This is the whistleblowers thoughts and who he talked to. Not specific names but the number of people. It goes into concerns about locking down all the records of that phone call. The process of where they believe that this was a coverup. And the challenge here as you read this is that, you know, you will be reading it as if its the bible, not knowing that what the motivations are and knowing the credibility of these people. And there is no pushback on the other side as far as questioning this anonymous person. Thats what this hearing today is really going to lead to and i think some of the questions will go down that road to the director of National Intelligence. Sandra dana, the questions could have been changing in the last few minutes as now that complaint has been made public. Lawmakers overnight were able to get a chance to look at it. You see the Committee Hearing room is fairly empty now. You imagine there might be a little bit of scrambling before they get underway. No doubt they will. One of the things youll see the members of congress focus on the democrats will be very frustrated about process and timing. Theyll say why did you hold this back . This is to the acting dni. Why did you hold this back . We as a congress, we have the law on our side that were supposed to get whistleblower reports direct to us. However, the Justice Department office of Legal Counsel came out and said they concluded that a mandated disclosure to congress was not warranted because it did not address the urgent funding, administration or operation of an intelligence activity. That seems very well reasoned to many if you are digging in on the process thats what you could see. You have at least one member of the committee here who is also a president ial candidate. This does have implications in an election year. When i was on capitol hill we went through that whole process of impeaching bill clinton at the time. He had already been reelected back in the 70s Richard Nixon had already been reelected. This is uncharted waters. We dont know how high the drama is going to be. If past hearings are any guide i think people will want to tune in. Sfwl i want to read the opening line. Im reporting an urgent concern in accordance with the procedures outline and 18 more pages. The urgent concern could be page 3 of the transcript with the ukrainian president from yesterday, sandra. It reads and i want to get Jason Chaffetz what we can expect today in a moment. Here is the president talking. I would like for you to do us a favor but then it goes on to talk about the server. They say ukraine has it. That all goes back to russian collusion for the election of 2016. The president says a lot of things went on, the whole situation. I would like to have the attorney general call you or your people and i would like to get to the bottom of it. He mentions bob mueller and his testimony the day prior. They say a lot of it started with ukraine. That favor is connected directly toward the investigation what bill barr is trying to get to the bottom of it. When he was sworn in as attorney general he promised the American People that in that position. Sandra you mentioned how were seeing lawmakers enter the room. Adam schiff and castro and swalwell have entered the room. For Many Americans this is their first look at joe maguire, the director of National Intelligence. He has arrived on capitol hill. We await his arrival in the hearing room. 36 years of military experience. Many people will learn a lot more about him today. The dni is usually not somebody youll see on cable television. They arent used to making Television Appearances at all. I think he is not a reluctant witness today. I think however that he will in a professional and sophisticated way take umbrage at anybody who questions his character. The questions from the democrats will be it will be framed like this. Democrats will say you are just protecting the president. You broke the law by not sending us this whistleblower report. You are supposed to be in charge and you, you, you. It will be a lot of accusations against him. Now people dont know Joseph Maguire very well. The president has known him he has been at the dnis office for a while and they go to the president s Office Every Day and brief him and he can ask them all the questions he wants. He has confidence in joe maguire. You saw the president say that last week. Whether the republicans on the committee know him well enough to defend him from the attacks sure to come. Well see. I think he will be willing to defend himself. He has an amazing track record as a patriot and public servant. Bill as we see more coming into the room lets bat around the order that we have here. Ian prior. Tell us where you are on this today as we get ready for this hearing. One of the things i think youll see, congress will try to draw distance between dni and doj and draw out from maguire did you want to give this to congress but stopped by the loc opinion with the department of justice . Thats the angle theyll go. Right now democrats feelings towards barr. He was mentioned in the call. I think theyll try and get to him and maybe get him to come in and testify about something. Now look, the olc opinion was very well reasoned and the complaint was given to the Public Integrity unit and they determined no Campaign Finance violation, no violation of law. I think the president and his team are on firm legal ground but of course this will be a political theater. Well see how it goes. I was going to follow up on danas points. Joe maguire has already pushed back. The Washington Post had a piece that he was said to resign if he wasnt allowed to speak freely on capitol hill. Moments later he puts out a statement in which he says at no time have i considered resigning my position since assuming this role in august 16th. Ive never quit anything in my life and im not going to start now. So that pushback already happened because of a media story yesterday. Expect that to continue. Sandra ahead of this the president appears to have just tweeted out a moment ago saying democrats are traig to destroy the Republican Party and all it stands for. Stick together, play their game and fight hard, republicans. Our country is at stake. The president just a moment ago. Remember yesterday also the white house realizes theyre in a battle not just about a document and a whistleblower, this is about his presidency. I would imagine that the white house woke up this morning like after a big night out and then you wake up in the morning and you have to survey the situation and damage. Like triage, try to figure out who is with us and who is against us . The democrats have been clear they plan to go down the impeachment inquiry. I believe the reporting earlier nancy pelosi thinks she is getting closer to having the number of 218. She will update us at 11 00 a. M. It is curious they decided to go down that road before one, seeing the transcript, two seeing the whistleblower report, three seeing the testimony. It is like cortez burning the ships. There is nothing to get back on. Bill adam schiff is the democrat from california. He has made countless cable news appearances and been on the russia matter since the very beginning. He is the head of this committee today. Devin nunes his counterpart, the republican from california, will be the Ranking Member, the minority member there. You will see others like Michael Turner out of ohio and John Ratcliffe who at one time was floated to be the next attorney general. That lived for about 12 hours but John Ratcliffe is on this committee today. Want to bring in Jason Chaffetz. A veteran of hearings like these. What is your expectation as a former congressman . Highly combative. The democrats want to do everything to try to cast dispersion and create a scenario that makes it look as if there is something that is being hidden. Lets remember this whistleblower report is purely here say. There is no firsthand account here. The questions to the dni are going to be why didnt you share this with us . If it was an urgent concern, which is a legal term that triggers the Intelligence Community, do you have to provide that information to the committee . But the dni evidently did not find it was an urgent concern and the whistleblower had a lot of political bias. Sandra weigh in on this moment where joe maguire has now taken his seat in the hearing room as you can see. The photo op is happening. A bit about the man were about to hear from, jason. I talked to several members who are on the committee and they really dont know who he is. I think both sides dont have personal experience with him. The committee will look like its empty. They are actually using a different room than normal. The committee is much smaller in its structure. Fewer members. They have different latitudes than other hearings. The chairman and Ranking Member can ask longer sessions of questions. I think the hearing will be different than ones weve seen on television before. I think there will be a bit of a food fight between devin nunes and adam schiff about the process, about how this stuff was handled and the integrity of the transcript. But really its kind of a mute point if you believe that the transcript that donald trump released is the sum total of whats there. That is no it is not the kind of collusion that adam schiff would want you to believe that it is. Sandra he served as the sixth director of National Counter Terrorism Center prior to his role as the acting dni, bill. An extraordinarily Accomplished Navy special warfare officer. He retired after 36 years in the uniform and took over in this role august 15th, 2019. Bill well see what democrats choose to focus on based on the whistleblower complaint and well see what they choose to focus on based on the transcript. Fivepage transcript from yesterday. Andy mccarthy, on page 4 of that transcript it reads the other thing, the president talking. There is a lot of talk about bidens son that biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great. Biden went around bragging he stopped the prosecution. If you can look into it. It sounds horrible to me, end quote. Ukrainian president speaks after that. Based on the fivepage transcripts as they gavel to order here, can you tell us a singular point that you believe will be most significant for democrats on the committee . Yeah, i think that it comes down to barrs investigation. If you believe as i do the barr investigation is a legitimate department of justice investigation, thats what the president asked for help on and there was a significant portion of that before the part of the conversation you just read. If you think the barr investigation is a cats paw of the Trump Campaign youll have a corrupt slant on it and what i expect to hear from the democrats. Bill stand by. Lets go to adam schiff now, the head of this committee. House intelligence as we gavel to order and begin at 9 12 eastern time. If our National Security is jeopardizeed. If our country is left undefended, the necessity to faithfully execute the office becomes mute. Where there is no country, there is no office to execute. And so the duty to defend the nation is foundational to the president s responsibilities. But what of this second responsibility to defend the constitution . What does that really mean . The founders were not speaking, of course, of a piece of parchment. Rather they were expressing the obligation of the president to defend the staoetion of our democracy, to defend our systems of checks and balances, that the constitution enshrines. To defend the rule of law. A principle which the idea of america was born were a nation of laws, not men. If we do not defend the nation, there is no constitution. But if we do not defend the constitution, there is no nation worth defending. Yesterday we were presented with a most graphic evidence yet that the president of the United States has betrayed his oath of office. Betrayed his oath to defend our National Security and betrayed his oath to defend our constitution. For yesterday we were presented with a record of a call between the president of the United States and the president of ukraine in which our president sacrificed our National Security and our constitution for his personal political benefit. To understand how he did so we must first understand how dependent ukraine is on the United States militarily, financially, diplomaticly and in every other way. Not just on the United States, but on the person of the president. Ukraine was invaded by its neighbor, by Vice President s russia. It remains occupied by Russian Irregular forces in a longsimmering war. Ukraine desperately needs our help and for years weve given it on a bipartisan basis. That is until two months ago when it was held up by President Trump. It is in this context after a brief congratulatory call from President Trump to president zelenskiy on april 21 and after the president s personal emissary giuliani made it clear to ukrainian officials that the president wanted dirt on his political opponent. It is in this context that the new president of ukraine would speak to donald trump over the phone on july 25th. President zelenskiy eager to establish himself at home as a friend of the president of the most powerful nation on earth, had at least two objectives. Get a meeting with the president , and get more military help. And so what happened on that call . Zelenskiy begins by ingratiateing himself and he tries to enlist the support of the president. He expresses his interest in meeting with the president and says his country wants to acquire more weapons from us to defend itself. And what is the president s response . Well, it reads like a classic organized crime shakedown. Short ever its rambling character this is the essence of what the president communicates. Weve been very good to your country, very good. No other country has done as much as we have. But you know what . I dont see much reciprocity here. I hear what you want, i have a favor i want from you, though. And im going to say this only seven times. You better listen good. I want you to make up dirt on my political opponent. Understand lots of it. On this and on that im going to put you in touch with people, not just any people. Ill put you in touch with my attorney general, bill barr. He has the whole weight of the american Law Enforcement behind him. And im going to put you in touch with rudy. You are going to love him, trust me. You know what im asking and ill say it a few more times. In a few more ways. And by the way dont call me again, ill call you when youve done what i asked. This is in sum and character what the president was trying to communicate with the president of ukraine. It would be funny if it wasnt such a graphic betrayal of the president s oath of office. But as it does represent a real betrayal there is nothing the president says here that is in americas interest, after all. It is instead the most consequential form of traj gaoe. It forces us to look at the remedy for impeachment. This matter would not have come to the attention of our committee or the nations attention without the courage of a single person, the whistleblower. As you know director maguire more so than perhaps any other area of government since we deal with classified information, Intelligence Committee is dependent on whistleblowers to reveal wrongdoing when it occurs. When the agencies do not selfreport. Because outside pairts are not allowed to scrutinize your work and to guide us. If that system is allowed to break down as it did here, if whistleblowers come to understand they wont be protected, one of two things happen. Serious wrongdoing goes unreported or whistleblowers take matters into their own hands and divulge classified information to the press in violation of the law and placing our National Security at risk. This is why the whistleblower system is so vital to us. And why your handling of this urgent complaint is also so troubling. Today we can say for the First Time Since weve released this morning the whistleblower complaint that you have marked unclassified that the substance of this call is a core issue, although by no means the only issue raised by the whistleblowers complaint which was shared with the committee for the first time only late yesterday. By law the whistleblower complaint, which brought this gross misconduct to light should have been presented to this Committee Weeks ago and by you, mr. Director, under the clear letter of the law. And yet it wasnt. Director maguire, i was very pleased when you were named acting director. If sue gordon was not going to remain i was grateful a man of your military background was chosen. A navy seal for 36 years and director of the National Counter Terrorism Center since december 2018. Your credentials are impressive. And in limited interactions weve had since you became director you have struck me as a good and decent man which makes your actions over the last month all the more bewildering. Why you chose not to provide the complaint to this committee as required by law. Why you chose to seek a Second Opinion on whether shall really means shall under the statute. Why you chose to go to a Department Led by a man, bill barr, who himself is implicated in the complaint and believes that he exists to serve the interests of the president , not the office itself, mind you, or the public interest, but the interest of the person of donald trump. Why you chose to allow the subject of the complaint to play a role in deciding whether congress would ever see the complaint. Why you stood silent when intelligence professional under your care and protection was ridiculed by the president. Was accused of potentially betraying his or her country. When by their very act of coming forward has shown more dedication to country, more of an understanding of the president s oath of office, than the president himself. We look forward to your explanation. Ranking member nunes. Thanks the gentleman. I want to congratulate the democrats on the rollout of their latest Information Warfare operation against the president. And their extraordinary ability to once again enlist the Mainstream Media in their campaign. This operation began with media reports from the prime instigators of the russian collusion hoax that a whistleblower is claiming President Trump made a nefarious promise to a foreign leader. The released transcript of that call has already debunked that central assertion. But that didnt matter. The democrats simply moved the goalpost and began claiming there doesnt need to be a quid pro quo for this conversation to serve as the basis for impeaching the president. Speaker pelosi went further when asked earlier if she would put brakes on impeachment if the transcript turned out to be benign. She responded quote, so there you go, if the whistleblower operation doesnt work out, the democrats and we have many candidates for impeachable offenses. That was her quote. So there you go. If the whistleblower operation doesnt work out, the democrats and their media as sets can always drum up Something Else. And what other information has come to light since the original false report of a promise being made. Weve learned the following. The complaint relied on hearsay evidence provided by the whistleblower. The Inspector General did not know the contents of the phone call at issue. The Inspector General found the whistleblower displayed arguably political bias against trump. The department of justice investigated the complaint and determined no action was warranted. The ukrainian president denies being pressured by President Trump. So once again the supposed scandal ends up being nothing like what we were told and once again the democrats, their media mouthpieces, and leakers are beginning up a fake story with no regard to the damage theyre doing to trust in government. Without acknowledging all the false stories they propagated in the past, including countless allegations that Trump Campaign colluded with russia to hack the 2016 election. Were supposed to forget about all those stories. But believe this one. In short, what we have with this story line is another steele dossier. Ill note here in the democrats mania to overturn the 2016 elections everything they touch gets politicized. With the russian hoax our intelligence agencies were turned into a political weapon to attack the president. Now today the whistleblower process is the casualty. Until about a week ago the need to protect that process was the primary bipartisan concern of this committee. But if the democrats were really concerned with defending that process, they would have pursued this matter with a quiet, sober, inquiry as we do for all whistleblowers. But that would have been useless for them. They dont want answers. They want a public spectacle and so weve been treated to an unending parade of press releases, press conferences and fake news stories. This hearing itself is another example. Whistleblower inquiries should not be held in public at all. As our Senate Counterparts democrats and republicans obviously understand, their hearing with mr. Maguire is behind closed doors. But again that only makes sense when your goal is to get information, not to create a media frenzy. The current hysteria has Something Else in common with the russian hoax. Back then they accused the Trump Campaign of colluding with russians when the democrats themselves were colluding with russians and preparing the steele dossier. Today they accuse the president of pressuring ukrainians to take actions that would help himself or hurt his political opponents. Yet there are numerous examples of democrats doing the exact same thing. Joe biden bragged that he extorted the ukrainians into hiring a prosecutor who happened to be investigating bidens own son. Three Democratic Senators wrote a letter pressuring the ukrainian general prosecutor to reopen the investigation into former Trump Campaign officials. Another democratic senator went to ukraine and pressured the ukrainian president not to investigate corruption allegations involving joe bidens son. According to ukrainian officials the Democratic National committee contractor alexandra tried to get ukrainian officials to provide dirt on Trump Associates and tried to get the former ukrainian president to comment publicly on alleged ties to russia. Ukrainian official was a source for nelly ohr, wife of department of justice official bruce o when hr as she worked on the antitrump operation conducted by fusion gps and funded by the democrats. And of course, democrats on this very committee negotiated with people who they thought were ukrainians in order to obtain nude pictures of trump. People can reasonably ask why the democrats are so determined to impeach this president when in just a year they will have a chance. In fact, one democratic congressman, one of the first to call for trumps impeachment, gave us the answer when he said quote, im concerned that if we dont impeach the president , he will get reelected. Unquote. Winning elections is hard and when you compete you have no guarantee youll win. But the American People do have a say in this. And they made their voices heard in the last president ial election. This latest gamut by the democrats to overturn the peoples mandate is unhinged and dangerous. They should end the entire dishonest grotesque spectacle and get back to work solving problems which every member of this committee was sent here to do. Judging by todays charade the chances of that happening any time soon are zero to none. I yield back. I think the gentleman, director rise for the oath and raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm the testimony you give today shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god. You may be seated. The record will reflect that the witness has been duly sworn. Director maguire, would you agree that the whistleblower complaint alleges serious wrongdoing by the president of the United States . Mr. Chairman, the whistleblower let me recognize you for your Opening Statement and you may take as much time as you need. Thank you very much, mr. Chairman. Chairman schiff, Ranking Member nunes and members of the committee, good morning. I would like to begin by thanking the chairman and the committee for agreeing to postpone this hearing for one week. It provided sufficient time to allow the executive branch to come complete its consultations how to accommodate the committees request. Ive told you this on several occasions and i would like to say this publicly. I respect you, i respect this committee, and i welcome and take seriously the committees oversight role. During my process i told the Senate Select committee of intelligence that congressional oversight of the intelligence activities is critical and essential to successful operations with the Intelligence Community. Having served as the director of the National Counter Terrorism Center for eight months and as the acting director of National Intelligence for the past six weeks i continue to believe strongly that the role of congressional oversight. As i pledge to the senate and pledge i will continue to work closely with congress serving in this capacity as acting director of National Counter terrorism or when i return to the National Counter Terrorism Center to insure you are fully informed of intelligence activities, to facilitate your ability to perform your oversight of the Intelligence Community. The American People expect us to keep them safe. The Intelligence Community cannot do that without this committees support. I turn to the matter at hand. There are few things i would like to say. I am not partisan and i am not political. I believe in a life of service and honored to be a public servant. I served under eight president s while i was in uniform. I have taken the oath to the constitution 11 times. The first time when i was sworn into the United States navy in 1974 and nine times during my subsequent promotions in the United States navy. Most recently former director dan coates administered the oath of office last december when i became the director of the National Counter Terrorism Center. I agree with you the oath is sacred. It is the foundation of our constitution. The oath to me means not only i swear faith and allegiance to that sacred document but a covenant i have with my workforce that i lead and every american that i will well and faithfully discharge the duties of my office. I come from a long line of Public Servants who have stepped forward even in the most difficult and austere times to support and defend our country. When i took my uniform off in july of 2010, it was the first time in 70 years that an immediate member of my family was not wearing the cloth of the nation. As a Naval Special warfare officer i had the honor of commanding at every level in the seal community. It was at times very demanding but the rewards of serving in americas special Operations Community more than make up for the demands. After my retirement, i was fortunate to work for a great private sector firm. I left the Business World after three years to lead a nonprofit charity. Some question would why i would leave a Business Career to run a charity. The answer was simple. Another opportunity to serve. I led a foundation dedicated to honoring the sacrifice of our fallen and severely Wounded Special operators. The foundation i led enabled hundreds of children of our fallen to attend college. It was extremely meaningful and rewarding. In the winter of 2018, i was asked by former director dan coates to return to Government Service to lead the National Counter Terrorism Center. This request was totally unexpected and was not a position i sought. But then again, it was another opportunity to serve my country. In particular, i knew that many of the young sailors and Junior Officers that i had trained 20 years earlier were now senior combat veterans deploying and still sacrificing. I decided that if they could continue to serve, returning to Government Service was the very least i could do. And now here i am sitting before you as the acting director of National Intelligence. With last months departure of dan coates and sue gordon. To great leaders and friends, i was asked to step into their very big shoes and lead the Intelligence Community until the president nominates and the Senate Confirms the next director of National Intelligence. I accepted this responsibility because i love this country. I have a deep and profound respect for the men and women of our Intelligence Community and the mission we execute every day on behalf of the American People. Throughout my career, i have served and led through turbulent times. I have governed every action by the following criteria. It must be legal, it must be moral, and it must be ethical. No one can take an individuals dignity away, it can only be given away. If every action meets those criteria, you will always be a person of integrity. In my nearly four decades of Public Service my integrity has never been requested until now. Im here today to unequivocally state that as acting dni i will continue the same faithful and nonpartisan support in a matter that adheres to the constitution and the laws of this great country as long as i serve in this position for whatever period of time that may be. I want to make it clear that i haveup held my responsibility to follow the law every step of the way in the matter that is before us today. I want to also state my support for the whistleblower and the rights and laws. Whistle blowing has a long history in our country dating back to the continental congress. This is not surprising because as a nation we desire for good government. Therefore, we must protect those who demonstrate courage to report alleged wrongdoing whether on the battlefield or in the workplace. Indeed, at the start of ethics training the executive branch each year were reminded that Public Service is a public trust. And as Public Servants we have a solemn responsibility to do whats right, which includes reporting concerns of waste, fraud, and abuse and bringing such matters to the attention of congress under the Intelligence Community whistleblower protection act. I applaud all employees who come forward under this act. I am committed to insuring that all whistleblower complaints are handled appropriately and to protecting the rights of whistleblowers. In this case, the complainant raised a matter with the Intelligence Community Inspector General. The Inspector General is properly protecting the complainants identity and not permit the complainant to have adverse consequences for telling the complaint. Upheeleding the integrity of the Intelligence Community and workforce is my number one priority. Throughout my career i relied on the men and women of the Intelligence Committee to do their jobs so i could do mine and i could personally attest that their efforts saved lives. I would now like to turn to the complaint and provide a general background on how we got to where we are today. On august 26th, the Inspector General forwarded the complaint to me from an employee in the Intelligence Community. The Inspector General stated the complaint raised an urgent concern, a legallydefined term under whistleblower protection act that has been discussed at length in our letters to committee on september 16 and 17. Before i turn to the discussion about whether the complaint met the definition of urgent concern, i first want the talk about an even more fundamental issue. Upon reviewing the complaint, we were immediately struck by the fact that many of the allegations in the complaint are based on a conversation between the president and another foreign leader. Such calls are typically subject to executive privilege. As a result we consulted with the White House Counsels Office and much of the information in the complaint was in fact subject to executive privilege. A privilege that i do not have the authority to waive. Because of that, we were unable to immediately share the details of the complaint with this committee. But continued to consult with the white House Counsels in an effort to do so. Yesterday the president released the transcripts of the call in question and therefore we are now able to disclose the details of both complaint and the Inspector Generals letter transmitting to us. As a result, i have provided the house and senate Intelligence Committees with the full, unredacted complaint as well as the Inspector Generals letter. Let me also discuss the issue of urgent concern. When transmitting a complaint to me, the Inspector General took the legal position that because the complaint alleges matters of urgent concern and because he found the allegations to be credible, i was required under the Intelligence Community whistleblower protection act to forward the complaint to our oversight committees within seven days of receiving it. As we have previously explained in our letters urgent concern is a statutorily defined term. To be an urgent concern the allegations must in addition to being classified, assert a flagrant, serious problem, abaouls or violation of law and relate to the funding, administration, or operation of an intelligence activity within the responsibility of the director of National Intelligence. However, this complaint concerns conduct by someone outside the Intelligence Community unrelated to funding, administration or operation of an intelligence activity under my supervision. Because the allegation on the fails did not appear to fall in the statutory framework, my office consulted the United States department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel and included we included the Inspector General in those consultation. After reviewing the complaint and the Inspector Generals transmittal letter the office of Legal Counsel determined that the complaints allegations do not meet the statutory requirement definition concerning legal urgent concern and found that i was no legally required. An unclassified of that memo was publicly released. As you know for those of us in the executive branch, office of Legal Counsel opinions are binding on all of us. In particular the office of Legal Counsel opinion states that the president is not a member of the Intelligence Community and the communication with a foreign leader involved no intelligence operation or activity aimed at collecting or analyzing foreign intelligence. While this opinion did not require transmission of the complaint to the committees, it did leave me with the discretion to forward the complaint to the committee. However, given the executive privilege issues i discussed, neither the Inspector General nor i were able to share the details of the complaint at the time. When the Inspector General informed me he intended to notify the committees of the existence of the complaint, mr. Chairman, i supported that decision to insure the committees were kept as informed as possible of this process to move forward. I want to raise a few other points about the situation we find ourselves in. First, i want to stress that i believe that the whistleblower and the Inspector General have acted in good faith throughout. I have every reason to believe that they have done everything by the book and followed the law. Respected the privileged nature of the information and waiting while the executive privilege issues were resolved. Wherever possible we have worked in partnership with the Inspector General on this matter. Whether we have different opinions on urgent concern i believe in the role of the Inspector General and value the independence he brings and his dedication and his role in keeping me and the committees informed of matters within the Intelligence Committee. Second, although executive privilege presented us from sharing the details to the committees until recently it doesnt mean the complaint was ignored. The Inspector General in consultation with my Office Referred this matter to the department of justice for investigation. Finally, i appreciate that in the past whistleblower complaints may have been provided to congress regardless of whether they were deemed credible or satisfied the urgent concern requirement. However, i am not familiar with any prior instances where a whistleblower complaint touched on such complicated and sensitive issues, including executive privilege. I believe that this matter is unprecedented. I also believe that i handled this matter in full compliance with the law at all times. And i am committed to doing so, sir. I appreciate the committee providing me this opportunity to discuss this matter and the ongoing commitment to work with the congress on your important oversight role. Thank you very much, sir. Thank you, director. Would you agree that the whistleblower complaint alleges serious wrongdoing by the president of the United States . The whistleblower complaint involved the allegation of that. It is not for me and the Intelligence Community to decide how the president conducts Foreign Policy or interaction with leaders of other countries, sir. Im not asking you to opine on how the president conducts Foreign Policyment im asking as the statute requires this complaint involved serious wrongdoing in this case by the president of the United States. An allegation of serious wrongdoing by the president of the United States. Is that not the subject of this complaint . That is the subject of the allegation of the complaint and two things, mr. Chairman. Let me ask you about that. The Inspector General found that serious allegation of his conduct by the president credible. Did you also find that credible . I did not criticize the Inspector Generals decision on whether or not it was credible. My question was whether or not it meets the urgent concern and the sevenday time frame that would follow. I have no question in his judgment that he considers it a serious matter. And you would concur, would you not, director, that this complaint alleging serious wrongdoing by the president was credible . Its not for me to judge, sir. It is for you to judge apparently. You shall provide it to congress but indeed you did judge whether this complaint should be provided to congress. Can we at least agree that the Inspector General made a sound conclusion that this whistleblower complaint was credible that is correct in the cover letter that has been provided to the committee i believe thats also made public, the decision and the recommendation by the Inspector General that in fact the allegation was credible. Can we also agree it was urgent that if the president of the United States was withholding military aid to an ally even as you received the complaint and was doing so for nefarious reason, to exercise leverage for the president of ukraine to dig up manufactured dirt on his opponent, can we agree it was urgent while that aid was being withheld . Im talking about the common understanding of what urgent means. Inspector general said it was urgent not only in the statutory meaning as everyone understand that term. Can we agree that it was urgent . It was urgent and important but my job as the director of National Intelligence was to comply with the whistleblower protection act and adhere to the definition of urgent concern, which is a legal term. And to adhere to the meaning of the term shall. Yes, sir. In this case, you sought a Second Opinion whether shall really means shall by going to the white house. No, sir. There were two things. As i said in my statement. One, it appeared that it also had matters of executive privilege. I am not authorized as the director of National Intelligence to waive executive privilege. At any time over the last month that you held this complaint did the white house assert executive privilege . Mr. Chairman, i have endeavored i think thats a yes or no question. Did they every exert executive privilege they were working through the executive prifrk ledge procedures. They never exerted executive privilege is that the answer . Mr. Chairman, if they did, we would not have released the letters yesterday and all the information that has been forthcoming. The first place you went was to the white house. Am i to understand that, it wasnt to the department of justice. The first place you went for a Second Opinion was the white house . I did not go for a Second Opinion. The question was is the information contained here subject to executive privilege. Not whether or not it was urgent concern. So the first place you went for advice whether you should provide the complaint as the statute requires to congress was the white house. I am not authorized as a director of National Intelligence to provide executive privilege information. I think it is prudent as a member of the executive branch to check to insure that in fact it does not. Im asking about the sequence. Did you first go to the white house to determine whether you should provide a complaint to congress . No, sir, that was not the question. The question was whether or not it has executive privilege. Not whether or not i should send it on to congress. Is the first part you went to outside your office to seek advice counsel direction the white house . I have consulted with the white House Counsel and eventually we also consulted with the department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel. My question is did you go to the white house first . I went to the office of Legal Counsel for advice, yes, sir. Well, im asking what you went to first. Did you go to the department of justice Legal Counsel first or the white house first . My team, my office, went to the office of the Legal Counsel first to receive whether or not the matter in the letter and in the complaint might meet the executive privilege. They viewed it and said weve determined that it appears to be executive privilege and until executive privilege is determined and cleared i did not have the authority to be able to send that forward to the committee. I worked with the office of Legal Counsel for the past several weeks to get resolution on this. It is a very deliberate process. Im still understand the chronology. You went to the office of Legal Counsel and then white House Counsel . Excuse me. Repeat that please, sir you first went to the office of Legal Counsel and then you went to the white House Counsel . No, no, no, sir, no, sir. We went to the white house first to determine, to ask the question. You went to the white house first. So you went to the subject of the complaint for advice first about whether you should provide the complaint to congress. There were issues within this a couple of things. One, it did appear that it has executive privilege. If it does have executive privilege it is the white house that determines that. I cannot determine that as the director of National Intelligence. In this case the white house, the president is the subject of the complaint. He is the subject of the wrongdoing. Were you aware when you went to the white house for advice about whether evidence of wrongdoing by the white house should be provided to the congress, were you aware the white House Counsel has taken the unprecedented position that the privilege applies to communications involving the president when he was president , involving the president when he wasnt prt and involve people who never served in the administration or even when they arent even talking to the president. Were you aware thats the unprecedented position of the white house, the white house you went to for advice about whether you should turn over a complaint involving the white house . Mr. Chairman, as i said in my Opening Statement i believe that everything here in this matter is totally unprecedented and that is why my former directors of National Intelligence forwarded them to you whether or not it met urgent concern or whether it was serious. This was different. And to me it just seemed prudent to be able to check and insure as a member of the executive branch before i sent it forward. A couple more questions and turn it over to the Ranking Member and he may consume as much time as i did. The second place you went to was the Justice Department. And you went to that department headed by a man bill barr who is also implicated in the complaint. And you knew that when you went to the department of justice for an opinion, correct, that bill barr was mentioned in the complaint . Mr. Chairman, i went to the office of Legal Counsel in consultation with the ic ig. He was a part of that to receive whether or not this met the criteria. That icig vehemently disagreed with the opinion of the bill barr Justice Department, did he not . He still considered it a matter of urgent concern. However, as you know, opinions from department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel are binding on all of us in the executive branch. Do you think its appropriate that you go to a department run by someone who is the subject of the complaint to get advice who is a subject of the complaint or implicated in the complaint with advice whether you should provide that complaint to congress. Did that conflict of interest concern you . Mr. Chairman, when i saw this report and complaint, immediately i knew that this was a serious matter. It came to me and i just thought it would be prudent to insure that im asking if the conflict of interest concerned you. Sir, i have to work with what ive got and that is the office of Legal Counsel within the executive branch. I had no you had a statute that says shall and then you said you had the discretion to provide it but did not. Because it did not meet the matter of urgent concern. That took away the sevendaytime line. I have endeavored to work with the office of Legal Counsel in order to get the material to you which you have we have provided to you yesterday. Now i have to tell you, chairman. It is not perhaps at the timeline that i would have desired or you, but the office of Legal Counsel has to make sure they make prudent decisions. Yesterday when the president released the transcripts of his call with the president of the ukraine, then they could no longer executive privilege no longer applied and thats when i was free to be able to send the complaint to the committee. You dont believe the whistleblower is a political hack, do you . I dont know who the whistleblower is to be honest with you. I make sure i protect his an imtee. It doesnt sound like much of a defense of the whistleblower. You dont believe the whistleblower is a political hack do you, director . I believe as i said before, mr. Chairman, i believe the whistleblower is operating in good faith. Followed the law. They couldnt be in good faith acting as a political hack, could they . Mr. Chairman, my job is to support and lead the entire Intelligence Community. That individual works for me. Therefore it is my job to make sure that i support and defend that person. You dont have any reason to accuse them of disloyalty to our country or suggest they are beholding to some other country do you . Absolutely not. I believe the whistleblower followed the steps every step of the way. However, the statute was one in this situation involving the president of the United States who is not in the Intelligence Community or matters underneath my supervision, did not meet the criteria for urgent concern. I think the whistleblower did the right thing and followed the law every step of the way and we just got stuck. Why when the president called the whistleblower a political hack and that he or she would be disloyal to the country why did you remain silent i issued a statement to my workforce with my commitment to the whistleblower protection and insuring i would provide protection to anyone who comes forward. The way this thing was blowing out it wasnt appropriate for me to make a press statement. I think it was not only appropriate but there is nothing that would have given more confidence to the workforce than to hearing you publicly say no one should be calling this professional who did the right thing a hack or a traitor or anything else. I have think that would have meant a great deal to the workforce. Mr. Nunes, youre recognized. Welcome, mr. Director. Its a pleasure to have you here and you are going to be part of a charade of legal word games. Theyll try to get you to Say Something that can be repeated by the media that is here that wants to report this story. I just want to get one thing straight because one of the quotes they are going to use from you is you saying that this was a credible complaint. That will be used and spun as you are saying that it was true. I want to give you an opportunity to you have not investigated the veracity or truthfulness of this complaint. Thats correct. The determination on credible was made by the ic Inspector General. He made the determination that it is credible and he also made the determination of urgent concern. My question i did not question his judgment there. The question i had was does, in fact, this allegation of wrongdoing meet the criteria, the statutory criteria of urgent concern and the other issue as i said complicated things, did it in fact the allegations within this whistleblower complaint involve executive privilege. Thank you for clarifying that. You mentioned in your testimony, have you ever or are you aware of any former dnis who have testified about whistleblower complaints in the public . Not to my knowledge, Ranking Member. I do not know. Are you aware of any cases like this that were put into the spotlight . Would this be the way to handle it out in the public like this . I am not aware of any but i want to say once again i believe that the situation we have and why were here this morning is because this case is unique and unprecedented. So why are cases normally not handled out in the public . All the other cases that came before either this committee or the Senate Committee whether or not they met the criteria of urgent concern were forwarded because they involved members of the Intelligence Community who were in organizations underneath the dnis authority and responsibility. This one didnt come that way because it involved a member an individual who is not a member of the Intelligence Community or an organization underneath the authority of the dni. So this one is different from all others in the past that im aware of. I want to get into how this all got out in the public over the last this has been orchestrated effort over two weeks. If you we were first told about it a week and a half ago and we were told very specifically that the whistleblower did not want to get any of this information out. They didnt want it to leak out. There were only a few potential groups of people that would have known about this complaint. You and your people within your office, the people within the Inspector Generals office, and the whistleblower and whoever that whistleblower gave this information to. So what im trying to ascertain is how would it run in all the Mainstream Media outlets . Even though they got a lot of it wrong. They had the basics that it involved the president of the United States talking to a foreign leader. So did anybody you or anybody in your office leak this to the Washington Post or nbc news . Ranking member, i lead the intelligent community. We know how to keep a secret. As far as how that got into the press i really do not know. I just know its all over the place and has been reported by different media for the past several weeks. Where they get their information from, i dont know. It was not from the Intelligence Community, from me or from my office. Thank you, director. So it is not the first time this has happened to this president. It happened with a call between the mexican president , the australian Prime Minister, it has happened twice before that pieces of transcripts leaked out. And of course this time it was leaked out again and the president thankfully was able to put this out because of the because of the actions of this situation as you said, unprecedented. Is it normal for the president of the United States to have their conversations leak out . This is the third time. I would have to leave that to the white house to respond to that. To me the president of the United States conversation with any other head of state i would consider privileged conversation. Clearly those conversations are being captured by the intelligence agencies. Not necessarily, sir. I mean, if the president i should say this theyre captured and disseminated. Captured and disseminated to the intelligence agencies. I have to be careful in this open hearing about how i respond to that. The Intelligence Community and the National Security agency obviously collect things to protect we might as well either have the president of the United States not talk to foreign leaders or we should just or publish all the transcripts because thats whats happening here. Ranking member. Somebody is leaking this and likely coming from the agencies that you oversee. Im not saying you dont know but we have transcript of the mexican president , australian Prime Minister and ukrainian Prime Minister leak out. The allegation was there there were 12 people who listened in on the conversation. Members of the National Security council and others, and then others were briefed from state department as well of the transcripts because they have an area of responsibility and they would be informed on the interaction. So there were a number of people from the white house briefed on the call. This would not be something that im quite sure of this the white house probably didnt leak this out. I wouldnt say the white house but there are individuals within the white house that may or may not. I dont know. It would not be from an intelligence intercept, i will say that. Im just saying the dissemination of these calls is supposed to be sacred, right . It is important for the state department and the appropriate agencies to get. Im not saying its all in the intelligence agency. When a president talks to a foreign leader it is confidential. There could be some facts of that conversation that you do want to get to the appropriate agency, not just the i. C. I want to be clear about that. But this is now the third time. Im not aware of this ever happening before of contents of calls like this getting out. I really dont know, Ranking Member. I dont have the numbers. It seems to me it is unprecedented and i would also say i think the decision by the president yesterday to release the transcripts of his conversation with the president of the ukraine is probably unprecedented as well. Appreciate you being here and have fun. Be careful what you say. Theyll use these words against you. I tell you what, either way im honored to be here and honored to be leading i appreciate your service to this country for a long time and talking again soon hopefully not in the public. Hopefully behind closed doors like this supposed to be done. I yield back. Thank you, mr. Chairman and thank you for being here and thank you for your profound service and the service of your family to this country. Director, what i find bewildering about this whole conversation is that we are not sitting here today and the American Public is not aware of the allegations of the president asking for a favor of investigation into his political opponent. Were not aware of the murky decision to withhold aid or aware of mr. Giulianis apparent establishment of a personal state department. Not aware of a possible retaliation against a u. S. Ambassador. None of this happens but for the decision of your Inspector General, Michael Atkinson, a man who was appointed by President Trump and confirmed by a republican senate, to come to this committee seven days after the complaint was required by law to be transmitted to us. It was his decision, personal decision, not the kaleidoscope of conspiracy theories the Ranking Member thinks is happening here but the decision of michael at kinson, an appointee of this president to come to this Committee Following not advice from you or any law, but following his own conscience without his decision to do this, none of this is happening, correct . I applaud michaels, the way he has done this. He has acted in good faith and followed the law every step of the way. The question is, congressman, does it did it or did it not meet the Legal Definition. I asked a very different question. Without his decision. Its a simple question, without his decision, none of this is happening, is that correct . We have to back up to the whistleblower as well. The whistleblower deserves the same accolades mr. Atkinson does. Were you ever advised by the white house not to provide this complaint to congress for any reason . No, congressman. Okay. As i understand it, the opinion was that you were not obligated to convey, despite the clear wording of the law, to convey the complaint to congress. So the decision was taken to defy a subpoena of this congress, the subpoena of september 17th to turn over the complaint. Who made the decision to defy that subpoena of september 17th . Congressman, urgent concerns im asking a simple question. Who made the decision to defy the congressional subpoena. Somebody said we will not abide by the subpoena and i would like to know who that was. Nobody did. I endeavored once we no longer had you urgent concern. What i needed to do is work through the executive privilege hurdles with the office of Legal Counsel at the white house. Although this was the most important issue to me, the white house has got quite a few other issues that they dealt with. I would have liked to have had as i said to the chairman, perhaps this moved a little faster than it did but it is a very deliberate process and it came to a head yesterday. When i received the information on the 26th of august we had seven days based on the whistleblower protection act. We lost seven days. It may have taken longer than you would have liked but you have the information. So im focused on the subpoena. The subpoena is on your desk from the congress of the United States and clear in what it asks for. You are saying a decision was never taken not to comply with that subpoena and somehow it wasnt complied with. I did not ignore i dealt with the chairman of this committee and asked to have one more week to be able to do what i needed to do to get this information released. He was gracious enough. It was something that was ready to go. I was fully committed to this committee and to the chairman to get that information. I finally was able to provide that yesterday. Thank you, director. Did you or your office ever speak to the president of the United States about this complaint . Congressman, im the president s intelligence officer. I speak with him several times throughout the week. Did you ever speak to the president about this complaint . My conversations with the president , because im the director of National Intelligence, are privileged and it would be inappropriate for me. It would destroy my relationship with the president in Intelligence Matters to divulge any of my conversations with the president of the United States. To be clear for the record you are not denying that you spoke to the president about this complaint. What im saying is i will not divulge privileged conversations that i have as a director of National Intelligence with the president. Has the white house its just a member of the executive branch as a member of the National Security council and Homeland Committee and i just have to maintain the discretion and protect the conversation with the president of the United States. Thank you, i appreciate that answer. The clock is broken. I will yield back the balance of my time. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you for being here. You and i are at competitive disadvantage. Neither one of us are lawyers. That may be a badge of honor for some of us. You have lawyers on your staff, sir . I do, congressman. And your lawyers have looked at this definition thoroughly and given you advice . Yes, congressman. If the black letter law was so clear how do we have different attorneys giving you and i different opinions, rhetorical question with respect to this issue . Just to clarify, might atkinson was in front of us last week and did a good job of telling us what he did and didnt do. We know what he was able to do. Its part of his investigation. He did not request records of the call from the president and the reason he did he cited difficulty working through all of that. It probably meant he couldnt comply with the 14day time frame. Even he did not try to overrun the white houses executive privilege over the conversation the president had with president zelenskiy. He also said in his letter i also determined, quoting michael, i also determined that there were reasonable grounds to believe that their relating to the urgent concern appeared credible. Thats a different statement than a flat out it is credible. A rhetorical statement. Is there anything in statute from your lawyers advising you that says that the determination of urgent concern lies solely with the icig . No, sir, i was never advised by my Legal Counsel to that effect. To your knowledge has the Justice Department ever weighed in to say the fact that dni cant make a separate decision with respect to the seven day process that the matter is not of urgent concern as your team decided . The matter of urgent concern is a legally defining term. It is pretty much either yes or no. Thats not the case, admiral. Because i. G. Said it was and you are saying its not under that Legal Definition because it involved the president. The last time i checked you are familiar with change of command. He is not in your chain of command you are in his chain of command. For definite reasons that appear to be credible it doesnt meet the statutorily urgent concern with respect to the whistleblower protections of the ig and your team made that call. Inspector general made a different call. No, sir. My team it was the department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel that made the determination that it was not urgent concern. All we wanted to do was just check and see. And to me it just seemed prudent with the matter at hand right now to be able to just make sure that in fact it did. And when it didnt i want to say once again i endeavored to get that information to this committee. Just to clarify the role that the Inspector General had with respect to the department of justice i heard you say he was involved in the conversations allowed to make his case but also said you give him the letter. Gave Justice Department the letter. What was his exact involvement in making his case to the Justice Department. He was there physically or his lawyers . To the best of my knowledge the icigs transmittal letter as well as the complaint from the whistleblower were forwarded to the office of Legal Counsel for their determination. I believe that is what they based their opinion on. So you dont think if im incorrect ill come back to the committee and correct that, sir. Appreciate that. Tough spot, appreciate your long storied history. I apologize if your integrity was insulted. That happens in this arena lot. Sometimes justified and most of the time not. Your integrity was not justified. We have differences of opinion when we started losing those different of opinion we start to attack each other and call each other names and those kinds of things and so my experience is when you have a legal matter ive got lawyers, i pay, you have lawyers you pay. Typically stick with the lawyers im paying. You had good legal advice on this issue and a tough spot making to make sure the whistleblower was protected and if there was something awry it would get the full hearing it is getting. Thank you for your service and i yield back. Thank you, mr. Chairman. And director maguire, thank you so much for being here. I want to turn to what i fear may be one of the most damaging longterm effects of this whistleblower episode and that is the Chilling Effect it will have on others in government who may witness misconduct but now may be afraid to come forward to report it. Sir, im worried that Government Employees and contractors may see how important this situation has played out and decide it is not worth putting themselves on the line. The fact that a whistleblower followed all of the proper procedures to report misconduct and then the department of justice and the white house seems to have weighed in to keep the complaint hidden is problematic, sir. I want to know whether or not you see how problematic this will be and having a Chilling Effect on members of the ic that you are sworn to represent and os tenibly protect. I think thats a fair assessment. I dont disagree with what youve said. I have endeavored to transmit to the Intelligence Community my support of the whistleblowers and im quite sure that for at least two hours this morning there are not many people in the Intelligence Community doing anything productive besides watching this. Right. My concern i think is a valid one. That in fact what has happened with this whistleblower episode will have a Chilling Effect. I also want to ask you have you given direction to this whistleblower that he can in fact or he or she can in fact come before congress . Director, when the president called the whistleblower a political hack and suggested that he or she was potentially disloyal to the country, you remained silent. I am not sure why. I think that adds to the Chilling Effect. The statute seems pretty clear that you shall everybody has a role to play. The process seems pretty clear. Part of it also includes you directing the whistleblower of his or her protected rights. Can you confirm that youve directed that whistleblower that he or she can come before congress . Congresswoman, there are several questions there. One, i do not know the identity of the whistleblower. Two, now that the complaint has come forward, we are working with his counsel in order to be able to provide them with security clearance. I think its pretty my question is pretty simple. Can you assure this committee and the American Public that the whistleblower is authorized to speak to the committee with the full protections of the whistleblower act . Can you confirm that . Right now im working through that with the chair and to the best of my ability i believe the chair was asking to have the whistleblower come forward. Im working with counsel, with the committee, to support that. Can you assure the American Public that the end result will be that the whistleblower will be able to come before this committee and congress and have the full protections of the after all, what is the whistleblower statute for if not to provide those full protections against retaliation, against litigation . Im doing everything to endeavor to support that. Director, do i have your assurance once you work out the security clearances for the whistleblowers counsel that whistleblower will be able to relate the full facts within his knowledge that concerned wrongdoing by the president or anyone else, that he or she will not be inhibited in what they can tell the committee, not some minder from the white house or elsewhere sitting next to them telling them what they can answer or not answer. Can i have your assurance the whistleblower will be able to testify fully and freely and enjoy the protections of the law . Yes, congressman. I yield back. Mr. Director, i also wanted to understand what you are going to do to try to insure the trust of the employees and contractors that you represent to assure the American People that the whistleblower statute is, in fact, being properly adhered to and that no further efforts would be to obstruct an opportunity for a whistleblower who has watched misconduct to actually get justice. Congresswoman, supporting and leading the men and women of the Intelligence Community is my highest priority. As director of National Intelligence i believe i serve. I want to go on record being very clear that this will have a Chilling Effect and that is exactly not what the statute was intended for. It was intended for transparency and ind intended to give the whistleblower certain protections and the American People deserve that. Bill hearing continues. Well get a 60minute break and back with more testimony in a moment. 60 seconds here. The complaint we now have director is based on hearsay. The person who wrote it said i talked to people and they told me these things. The American Public has a ability to compare them. What is clear about the complaint its based on political issues, mr. Director. He is alleging or she is alleging that the actions of the president were political in nature. Now, thats my concern about how this has applied to the whistleblower statute. Thats intended to better provide those in the Intelligence Community an opportunity to come to congress when they are concerned about abuses of powers and laws but it is about the Intelligence Community, its about abuse of surveillance, about the abuse of the spy mechanisms that we have. This is about actually the product of surveillance. Someone has had access to surveillance that related the president s conversations and has brought it forward to us. I would like for you to turn for a moment and tell us your thoughts of the whistleblower process and the concerns as to why it has to be there so that the Intelligence Community can be held accountable and we can have oversight. It certainly wasnt there for oversight of the president. It was there for oversight for the Intelligence Community. So if you could describe your thoughts on that. And then i was very interested in your discussion on the issue of executive privilege because there has been much made of the fact that the law says on the whistleblower statute that you shall. Clearly you have a conflict of laws when you have both the executive privilege issue and the issue of the word shall. First can you tell us the importance of the whistleblower statute with respect to accountability of the Intelligence Community and our role of oversight there, and then your process, your effects of being stuck in the middle where you have these conflicts. Congressman, the Intelligence Community whistleblower protection act is to apply to the Intelligence Community and then it pertains to financial, administrative or operational activities within the Intelligence Community in the under the oversight and responsibility of the director of National Intelligence. It does not allow a member of the Intelligence Community to report any wrongdoing that comes from anywhere in the federal government. And so with that i do believe that is about the intelligence whistleblower protection act with the best vehicle the whistleblower had to use. It came to me and discussion with our icig, who is a colleague. And the determination was made by the well, that he viewed that it was, in fact, credible and that it was a matter of urgent concern. And i just thought it would be prudent to have another opinion. I have worked with lawyers my whole career, whether it was the rule of armed conflict. Admiralty claims or rules of engagement or the uniform code of military justice and i have found that different lawyers have different opinions on the same subject. We have nine justices in the supreme court, more often than not the opinions are 54. It doesnt mean 5 are right and 4 are wrong. Theyre differences of opinion. When this matter came to me i have a lot of life experience. I realized the importance of the matter that is before us this morning. And i thought that it would be prudent for me to insure that in fact it met that statute before i sent it forward in compliance with the whistleblower protection act. And i hope that responds to your question. I yield back. As an aside i want to mention my colleague is right on both counts. Its not okay but also by summary of the president s call was meant to be part in parity the fact thats not clear is a separate problem in and of itself. Of course the president never said if i if you dont understand me ill say it seven more times. My point is thats the message the ukraine president was receiving in not so many words. Mr. Carson. Thank you, chairman schiff. Thank you, director maguire for your service. Director maguire, this appears to be the first Intelligence Community whistleblower complaint that has ever, ever been withheld from congress, is that right, sir . Congressman carson, i believe that it might be and once again i said in my statement it is in fact as far as im concerned unprecedented. It is unprecedented, sir. Do you know why its unprecedented . I think its because the law that congress that this very committee drafted really couldnt be clearer. It states upon receiving such an urgent complaint from the Inspector General you, the director of National Intelligence, quote, shall end quote forward it to the intel committees within seven days, no ifs, ands or buts. Even when the i. G. Has found complaint to be urgent or even credible your office has consistently transmitted those complaints to the Intelligence Committees. Is that right, sir . Congressman carson, in the past even if they were not a matter of urgent concern or not credible they were forwarded. In each and every instance prior to this it involved members of the Intelligence Community who were serving in organizations underneath the control of the dni. This one is different because it did not meet those two criteria. Does executive prish ledge or laws negate the security of democratic elections and her democracy. No, it does not. Notwithstanding director this unambiguous mandate and the consistent practice of your office that you withheld this urgent complaint from congress the at the direction of the white house and the Justice Department. You follow their orders instead of the law. If the Inspector General had not brought this complaint to our attention, you and the Trump Administration might have got efn away with this unprecedented action. Sir, you released a statement yesterday affirming your oath to the constitution and your dedication to the rule of law. Im having trouble understanding how that statement can be true in light of the facts here. Can you explain that to us, sir . Congressman carson, a couple of things. The white house did not did not direct me to withhold the information. Neither did the office of Legal Counsel. That opinion has been unclassified and disseminated. It was urgent concern. A Legal Definition. Urgent concern met the certain criteria weve discussed several times. It did not. All that did was take away the seven days. Now, as i said before just because it was not forwarded to this committee does not mean that it went unanswered. The icig and the Justice Department referred it to the federal bureau of investigation for investigation. So this that was working while i was endeavoring to get the executive privilege concerns addressed so that it can then be forwarded. It was not stonewalling. I didnt receive direction from anybody. I was just trying to work through process and the law the way it is written. I have to comply with the way the law is, not the way some people would like it to be. If i could do otherwise, it would have been much more convenient for me, congressman. And lastly, director, as you sit here today, sir, do you commit to providing every single whistleblower complaint intended to congress to the Intelligence Committee required by the statute. If its required by the statute, yes, i will. Thats good to know, sir. I certainly hope so. Because i think the unprecedented decision to withhold this complaint from congress, i think it raises concerns, very serious concerns for us and for me. And i think that we need to get to the bottom of this. I yield the balance of my time. Thank you. Thank you. How much time does the gentleman have remaining . Director, you were not directed to withhold the complaint, is that your testimony . Yes, thats absolutely true. You exercised your discretion to withhold the complaint from the committee. I did not, sir. What i did was i delayed it because it did not meet the statutory definition of urgent concern and i was working through youre aware, you spent a lot of time focusing on the definition of urgent concern. You are aware the practice of your office has been that regardless whether the complaint meets the definition of urgent concern, regardless of Inspector General found credible or incredible the complaint is always given to our committee. You are aware thats the unbroken practice since the establishment of your office and the Inspector General, are you aware of that . Chairman, every previous whistleblower complaint forwarded to the Intelligence Committees involved a member of the Intelligence Community and an organization under which the director of National Intelligence had authority and responsibility. But you are aware the past practice has been were talking about urgent concern here, that whether you or the Inspector General or anybody else it meets the statutory definition the past practice has always been to give it to committee. Youre aware of that, right . Im aware this is unprecedented and with that, sir, i agree, this has never happened before but then again this is a unique situation. But you director made the decision. You made the decision to withhold it from the committee for a month when the white house had made no claim of executive privilege, when the department of justice said you dont have to give it to them, but you can. You made the decision not to. Not true, sir. What the office of Legal Counsel said that it does not meet the Legal Definition of urgent concern. It said you are not required. It didnt say you cannot provide it, it said you are not required to. If you dont want to we arent going to force you. You are not required but didnt say you cant, am i right . It allowed me i said that in my Opening Statement. Even so, it was referred to the f. B. I. For investigation and i was endeavoring to get the information to you, mr. Chairman. I could not forward it as a member of the executive branch without executive privileges being addressed. I feel that the white House Counsel was doing the best that they could in order to get that and it took longer than i would have liked, thats for sure. But that came to conclusion yesterday with the release of the transcripts and because the transcripts were released, no longer was there a situation of executive privilege and i was then free to send both the Inspector Generals cover letter and complaint to you. At no time was there any intent on my part sir, ever, to withhold the information from you as the chair, this committee or the senate Intelligence Committee. I wish i had the confidence of knowing that but for this hearing but for the deadline that we were forced to set with this hearing that we would have been provided that complaint. I dont know that we would have ever seen that complaint. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you, mr. Maguire for being here today. I think its a shame we started off this hearing with fictional remarks, the implication of a conversation that took place between a president and foreign leader putting words into it that did not exist. They are not in the transcript. I will intend those were intentionally not clear. The chairman described it as parody. This is not the time and place for parody when we are trying to seek facts nor that those involved with the conversation agree with the parody that the chairman gave us. Unfortunately today many innocent americans will turn on their tv and the media will only show that section of what the chairman had to say. Im also glad to know that Many Americans have seen this movie too many times and they are tired of it. Let me get to some questions if i can. Lets go to the word credible. Credible does not mean proven true or factual. Would that be correct in this situation . I find no fault in your logic, congressman. The interpretation it was credible but also was that decision made by the ig before seeing the transcript of the conversation . I believe that the icig conducted to his best of his ability the investigation and he found to his ability that based on the evidence and discussing it with the whistleblower that he thought that in fact it was credible. The ig didnt necessarily have the transcript of the conversation. No, he did not. Thats my question. To another point, you know, one of the issues that arose out of the russia investigation was the question over the latitude provided to the u. S. President to conduct Foreign Affairs and 2017 i asked then c. I. A. Director brennan how he viewed statements made by president obama to russian president medvedev having more flexibility to negotiate after his 2012 election. President medvedev replied he would transmit the information to vladimir and medvedev stood with president obama in an open hearing. Braen brennan insisted on not answering because it was between heads of government. He further claimed he was avoiding getting involved in political partisan issues which brings me to a similar question related to the whistleblower complaint. You said this executive privilege is unwaivererable and consistent with what director brennan was implying. Only the white house and the president can waive executive privilege. Only they can waive that. Director brennan gave me the impression its the law. Do you believe the president is entitled to withhold his or her come indications from congress if used in a whistleblower case. The president when he conducts diplomacy and deals with foreign heads of state. He has every right to be able to have that information be held within the white house and the executive branch. And if yesterday i think the transmission of the call is unprecedented. And it is also, i think that other future leaders when they interact with our head of state might be more cautious in what they say and reduce the interaction that they have with the president because of that release. We may need to change our process here. I guess if a decision regarding executive privilege maybe it should be made prior to submitting the communication to congress. Well, either that, i believe this committee wrote the law and based on what were doing today perhaps it needs to be relooked. I dont know. I leave that to the legislative branch. Also we may need to change process. The 14 days, that might be kind of tough the adhere to. I think maybe this is special circumstance, unprecedented. Maybe there should be leeway in the time frame instead of the narrow 14 days. I dont know if you know. Did you feel or did the i. G. Every say that they felt rushed to making a decision because of the 14day process . No, congressman. I believe that he have is a very experienced Inspector General. He is used to dealing with the 14day process and when you work under a timeline like that he worked with his staff and i think endeavored to the extent. He was following the statute as he believed it was written. So i would think that any prudent lawyer would like to have more time to be able to collect the facts and do other things but Michael Atkinson was under the 14daytime line and he did the best of his ability to comply with it. Did you feel rushed . I did not. I yield back. Thank you. Congressman. Thank you, mr. Chairman and thank you, director maguire for your extraordinarily long service to our country. At any point during this process did you personally threaten to resign if the complaint was not provided to the committee . No, congressman, i did not and i know that story has appeared quite a bit and i issued a statement yesterday. All right. Thank you. When you read the complaint, were you shocked at all by what you read . Congresswoman, as i said i have a lot of life experience. I joined the navy i understand your record. Could you just answer it . I realized full and well the importance of the allegation and i also have to tell you, congresswoman, when i saw that i anticipated having to sit if front of some committee sometime to discuss it. All right. The complaint refers to what happened after the july 25th conversation between the ukraine president and the president of the United States. And the white house lawyers ordered other staff to move the transcript from its typical repository to a more secure location to lock down all records of the phone call. Did you did that reaction to the transcript seem to you like a recognition within the white house that the call was completely improper . Congresswoman, i have no firsthand knowledge of that. All i have is the knowledge that the whistleblower alleges in his allegation the whistleblower complaint. I dont know whether in fact thats true or not. My only situation is from the whistleblowers letter. Knowing that the whistleblower appeared to be credible based on the evaluation by the Inspector General and knowing that that effort was undertaken by the white house to cover it up, why would you then as your first action outside of the Intelligence Community go directly to the white house to the very entity that was being scrutinized and complained about in the complaint, why would you go there to ask their advice as to what you should do . Congresswoman, the allegation that is made by the whistleblower is second hand information, not known to him or her firsthand. Except it was determined to be credible. There was an investigation done by the Inspector General. Let me go on to another issue. President trump over the weekend tweeted it appears that an american spy in one of our intelligence agencies may have been spying on our own president. Do you believe that the whistleblower was spying on one of our intelligence agencies or spying on the president . As i said several times so far this morning, i believe that the whistleblower complied with the law and did everything that they thought he or she thought was responsible under the Intelligence Community whistleblower protection act. You did not speak out to protect the whistleblower did you. Congresswoman i did, yes, within my own workforce. I thought there was enough stuff appearing in the press that was wrong and absolutely incorrect and i didnt think that i needed to respond to every single statement that was out there that was incorrect. So what i did is my loyalty is to my workforce. Thank you. The president on monday said who is this socalled whistleblower, who knows the correct facts . Is he on our countrys side . Do you believe the whistleblower is on our countrys side . I believe that the whistleblower and all employees who come forward to the icig to raise concerns of fraud, waste, and abuse are doing what they perceive to be the right thing. So working on behalf of our country. Are you aware of the fact that whistleblowers within the federal government have identified waste, fraud and abuse of over 59 billion that has had the effect of benefiting the taxpayers and keeping our country safe as well . Congresswoman im not familiar with the dollar value. Having been in the Government Service for nearly four decades i am very much aware of the value of the Whistleblower Program. One final question. Did the president of the United States ask you to find out the identity of the whistleblower . I can say although i would not normally discuss my conversations with the president , i can tell you emphatically no. Has anyone else within the white house or the department of justice asked you . No, congresswoman. I yield. Sandra Joseph Mcguire continues his testimony on capitol hill. Were awaiting a News Conference with nancy pelosi. Well take a quick break and well be right back. Unlawful effort to protect the president. There is others i could read as they have sought i believe to destroy your character. I will give you the opportunity to answer very clearly, are you motivated by politics in your work or professional behavior . Are you motivated by politics in your work or professional behavior . No. I am not. I am not political. I am not partisan and i did not look to be sitting here as the acting director of National Intelligence. I thought that there were perhaps other people who would be best and more qualified to do that but the president asked me to do this and it was my honor to step up and for while im doing it to lead and support the intelligence communities. Do you think youve followed the law the way you handled this complaint. I know i do. Have you sought to protect the president or anyone else from any wrongdoing. I have not. What i have done is endeavored to follow the law. Do you believe you had a legal responsibility to follow the guidance of the office of Legal Counsel . The opinion of the office of Legal Counsel is binding on the executive branch. Thank you. Now there has been a big deal made about the fact this is the first whistleblower complaint that has been withheld from congress but it is also true, isnt it, that its the first whistleblower complaint that has potentially falls under executive privilege and the first time it included information outside the authority of the dni, is that creek . To the best of my knowledge thats correct my colleagues sitting here you are nuts if you think that your cause is just by attacking this man. And by impugning his character when it is clear that he felt there is a discrepancy and deficiency in the law. He was trying to do the right thing. He felt compelled by the law to do exactly what he did. The entire tone is that somehow you are a political stooge who has done nothing but try to protect the president. This is nuts. Anyone watching this hearing will surely walk away with the clear impression you are a man of integrity who did what you felt was right regardless of the questions and the innuendo cast by some of my colleagues sitting here today. One more thing before i yield my time. I think we can agree that leaks are unlawful and that leaks are damaging and for heaven sakes weve seen plenty of that over the last three years and there is a long list of leaks that have had clear implications for our National Security. Meaningful implications for our National Security. I want to know, do you know who is feeding the press information about this case . And have you made any referrals to the department of justice for unlawful disclosures . Do you know who is feeding information about this case . No. Do you think it would be appropriate to make a referral to the department of justice to try to determine that . I believe that anybody who witnesses or sees any wrongdoing should refer any wrongdoing or complaint to the department of justice for investigation. Including investigation about leaks of classified information . Yes, congressman, any wrongdoing. I dont know what time it is because our clock isnt working. I suppose my time is up but i would conclude by emphasizing once again good luck convincing the American People that this is a dishonorable man sitting here. Good luck convincing the American People that he has done anything but what he thinks is right. If you think it scores political points with your friends who wanted to impeach this president from the day he was elected, then keep going down that road. Thank you, congressman. I would only say, director, no one has accused you of being a political stooge or dishonorable. No one has said so or suggested that. Youve accused him of breaking the law. But it is certainly our strong view and we would hope it would be shared by the minority that when the Congress Says that something shall be done, it shall be done. When that involves the wrongdoing of the president it is not an exception to the requirement of the statute. And the fact that this whistleblower has been left twisting in the wind for weeks and attacked by the president should concern all of us, democrats and republicans. That this was ever allowed to come to be that allegations this serious and this urgent were withheld as long as they were from this committee. That should concern all of us. No one is suggesting that there is a dishonor here but nonetheless we are going to insist that the law be followed. Mr. Chairman, will you yield . Thank you, sir for your service and for being here. As you know, those in public life who work and deal with other countries, ambassadors, secretaries of state, many in the intelligence field, they are vetted, they go for approval before the senate. They have to get clearance. And you understand the policy reasons for that, correct . Yes, congressman. Do you have any issues with civilians without approval, without vetting, without clearance, taking on those roles . Yes, i do, congressman. And why would you have those concerns . Well, in order to be able to handle Sensitive Information, whether diplomatic or certainly intelligence information, one must be vetted. This is the important part of protecting National Security. We just cant bring people in and automatically wave a page it is a matter of vetting. For me to come back into government the f. B. I. Went back for 15 years in my background, examined all my financial records to make sure that i was, in fact, worthy of having an intelligence clearance. And we do the same thing with the Intelligence Community. Everybody who is subject or everybody who is privileged you have access to intelligence information is a sacred trust. The American People expect us to keep them safe as i said earlier. In order to do that we need to insure that any person who has access to this Sensitive Information of the United States has been thoroughly vetted to insure that they are able to handle that information. Its not just the intel issues but the issues of National Policy that people have an official role that they carry out on behalf of the United States and we know what their role is, correct . What is your understanding right now of what mr. Giulianis role is . Mr. Congressman quigley, i respectfully just referred to the white house to comment on the president s personal lawyer. Okay. So far what you see he is his personal lawyer. Read in the complaint, we read in this modified transcript he is mentioned five times. Your reaction to the civilian without vetting has played this role. No, sir, all im saying is that i know what the allegations are. Im not saying that the allegations are true and thats where the committee. There isnt any question the credibility of the complaint thats in the transcript. The president mentions and speaks highly of mr. Giuliani, highly respected man. He was the mayor of new york, i would like him to call you and ask him to call you along with the attorney general. Your reaction to civilians dealing with this. It talks about our National Security. Inspector general talks about this as the highest responsibility among those that the dni has and obviously mr. Giuliani is playing this role. To your knowledge does he have security clearance . I dont know. Congressman quigley, i am neither aware or unaware whether or not mr. Giuliani has a security clearance. Before this all happened were you aware of his role or understanding what his role was doing what you do . Congressman quigley, my only knowledge of what mr. Giuliani does, i have to be honest with you, i get from tv and the news mead ya. I dont know what he does for the president. Are you aware of any communication by mr. Giuliani and your office about how he should proceed with this role given the classified nature, the National Security implications that are in the complaint that are in the transcript in the role that he is playing . I have read the transcripts just as you have. So my knowledge of his activity in there is just limited to the conversation that the president had with the president of ukraine. We respect your role and while we have differences of opinion we continue to respect your integrity and honor. But we have this vast amount of experience you have and we need to understand how it plays just to position with the complaint. Im reading omd officials informed departments and agencies that the president had issued instructions to suspend all u. S. Security assistance to ukraine. Your reaction to that. Congressman quigley, i think anything that has to do with the president s lawyer in these matters should be referred to the white house and the president for that. Im just reading the complaint. I lead and i support the Intelligence Community and the 17 different departments and agencies jaoubds naoegt my leadership. I do not lead the president and i have no authority or responsibility over the white house. You are aware with all your experience to the fact that we have this relationship with ukraine. That they are dependent upon us and this complaint doesnt concern you . You cant say that publicly that it concerns you . There is a lot of things that concern me. Im the director of National Intelligence. This one here i have to defer back to the conversation that the president had is his conversation. How the president of the United States wants to conduct diplomacy is his business and its not whether or not i approve or disapprove of it. That is the president s business on how he wants to conduct that, sir. The issue is whether it commits a crime and that bothers you. The time of the gentleman has expired. Director, complete your answer if you wish. If you wanted to respond you may. No, im fine. Thank you, chairman. Thank you, mr. Maguire. Thank you for being here. We appreciate your life of Public Service. My question relates to prior to the transmission on august 26th from the ig to the dni, were there any conversations that you had with the ig prior to august 26 related to this matter . Congresswoman there has been a lot thats happened in the last several weeks. As far as the timeline is concerned, i think that i would like to take that and get back to you and give you a full chronology if i may on the actual timeline of events. That will be very helpful to this committee in terms of if there were any preliminary conversations, what was discussed and if there was any action taken as a result of those conversations. I want to turn to the complaint itself which is made public for the American Public to read and let me preface this by saying that i greatly appreciate your statement that you believe the whistleblower is operating in good faith. I think thats very important for americans to hear. But on page 1 im not going the improvise for parity purposes like the chairman of this committee did. Ill quote it directly. The complaint reads quote i was not a direct witness to most of the events described. This seems like a very important line to look into. I think the American Public will have questions in particular about that line. So my question to you is for the record, did the ig fully investigate the allegations into this complaint at this time . Has the ig fully investigated the allegations in this complaint . As i said earlier congresswoman, i believe the Intelligence Community Inspector General did a thorough investigation with the 14day time frame he had. Under the timeline to the best of his ability made the determination it was both credible and urgent. I have no reason to doubt that Michael Atkinson did anything but his job. When you talk about a full investigation, were the veracity of the allegations in the complaint looked into . There were many references to white house officials. Do you know if the ig spoke with those white house officials and investigated the truthfulness of these allegations or was it a preliminary investigation sfwh i would have to refer to the ig to respond to you on that. I do not know the identity of the whistleblower, i do know that Michael Atkinson had, in fact, discussed this with the whistleblower and found his complaint to be credible. As far as who else he spoke with, i am unaware of what went on in Michael Atkinsons investigation into this matter. As of today the only individual we know the ig spoke with is the author and whistleblower. Congresswoman, what im saying im unaware who else Michael Atkinson may have spoken to. Im unfamiliar with his investigative process and everybody he spoke to in this regard. Thank you for the answer on the record. Again for the American Public, they will have many questions as they read this complaint today and because on page 1 it says no direct knowledge, i think its very important that we conduct that we have questions answered for individuals that do have direct knowledge. With that i yield back. Thank you. Mr. Swalwell. Mr. Maguire do you agree the definition of a coverup is to prevent people from discovering a crime . I would say thats close. I dont disagree with that, sir. In the whistleblowers complaint they allege the immediately after the president s call with the president of ukraine on july 25, white house lawyers moved quickly to direct white house officials to move electronic transcripts from one Computer System where it was normally stored to a secret information system, is that right . Congressman thats what was alleged in the complaint yes or no. All i know thats the allegation. Im asking you that. Thats the allegation. You read that allegation. The first people you go to after you read the that allegation are the white house lawyers who are telling the white house officials who see this transcript and move it into a secret compartment system, those are first people you go to. Yes or no. Yes. You get this complaint. Inspector general says urgent, credible. You have no wiggle room to not go to congress and instead you send your concerns to the subject of the complaint, the white house. So did the white house tell you after you sent your concern about privilege did they tell you to go to the department of justice next . My team, my counsel in consultation with the Intelligence Community Inspector General, went to the office of Legal Counsel. So we were not directed to do that. You said this did not involve ongoing intelligence activities. However, the whistleblower says that this is not the first time that the president s transcripts with foreign leaders were improperly moved to an Intelligence Community code word system. Is that part of the allegation i will let the letter speak for itself. What can also speak for itself if a transcript with a foreign leader is improperly moved into a classification system that would involve your responsibilities, is that right . Not necessarily. That is i do not it is not underneath my authority and responsibility. Once again, this is an allegation that has been made. Does not necessarily mean that that is a true statement. The allegation was determined to be urgent and credible by the inspect for general, is that right . Yes, it was. Would you also want to know considering youre the director of National Intelligence and transcripts are being moved into a secret intelligence system, whether other transcripts perhaps maybe the president s phone calls with Vladimir Putin and mbs or turkey or kim jongun, would you want to know if those were being improperly moved because the president is trying to cover up something . Congressman, how the white house, the office of the executive office of the president and the National Security counsel conduct their business is their business. It is your business to protect americas secrets, is that right . It is all of ours, this committee as well. If there is coverup activity because the president is working improperly with the Foreign Government it could compromise americas secrets. There is an allegation of a coverup. Im sure an investigation might lead credence or disprove that. Right now all we have is an allegation. Second hand information from a whistleblower. I have no knowledge whether oats a true or accurate statement. The department of justice opinion you relied upon you werent responsible for foreign election interference. What the office of Legal Counsel did was over 11 pages and opinion defining and explaining their justification for it not complying with urgent. Are you responsible for preventing election interference. Election interference. By a Foreign Government. I hope you nope this answer is yes or no. Are you responsible for preventing election interference. The top priority of the Intelligence Community. Is it your priority . Yes, it is. This complaint alleges a shakedown with a Foreign Government by a United States president involving a rogue actor as mr. Quigy pointed out with no authority under the United States and an effort by the white house to move the transcript of this call to a secret system, is that right . Thats whats alleged. I believe Election Security is my most fundamental priority. This complaint was the conversation of a president with a foreign leader, not Election Security. I yield back. If that conversation involved the president requesting help in the form of intervention in our election, is that not an issue of interference in our election . Chairman, once again this was sent to the federal bureau of investigation. I understand that. You arent suggesting that the president is somehow immune from the laws that preclude the u. S. Person from seeking foreign help in a u. S. Election, are you . What im saying, chairman schiff, is that none of us is above the law in this country. Thank you, chairman. Pleasure to be here with you. I tell my friends all the time ive gotten more surveillance as a member of congress than i did as an undercover officer in the c. I. A. I think you have more arrows shot at you since youve been dni than you did in your almost four decades on the battlefield. A specific question. The letter that is contained in the whistleblower package is dated august 12th. I recognize this may be a better question to be asking the icig. That letter is dated august 12th. And it is to the chairman of the Senate Select committee on intelligence and the chairman of this committee. Do you know if the whistleblower provided the letter to those two chairmen concurrently with the icig. No, i believe that the whistleblower and the icig acted in good faith and followed the law every step of the way. Good copy. Weve talked about the way the law on the whistleblower statute is says you shall share if its decided to be an urgent concern. However best practices has always been to share regardless of whether that urgent concern. Do you see any reason negative impacts on the Intelligence Community if that legislation was changed to say all whistleblower complaints should be shared with the committees . Thats correct. And in addition to that, congressman, lets just say the allegation was made against a member of this committee. Members of this committee, although you are the Intelligence Committee, are not members of the Intelligence Community and as the dni i have no authority or responsibility over this committee. My question is do you think that if every whistleblower complaint that was brought to the Intelligence Community Inspector General was always shared with this committee, would that have any impact on intelligence equities . I ask that because i dont know why when the statute was written it didnt say all should be shared rather than only urgent concern. My question to you as the head of the Intelligence Community do you think if we change that law would it have impact on intelligence equities . I dont think the law could be changed to cover all things that might possibly happen. I think we have a good law and it is well written. However, as i said, congressman, this is unprecedented and this is a unique situation. Why this one its why were sitting here this morning. I hope were not in this position again. If we do find ourselves in this position again i want to make sure there isnt any uncertainty in when information should be shared with this committee. Was the odni under you or your predecessor aware of an omb decision to suspend ukrainian aid as was alleged in this complaint . As far as im concerned personally, i have no knowledge of that and im unaware of anybody within the odni is aware of that. I dont know the answer to that. When i apologize for these legal questions that may be best directed at somebody else but i feel like you have a perspective. When does olc office of legislative Legal Counsel guidance override laws passed by congress . The office of Legal Counsel does not override laws passed by congress. What it does is it passes legal opinion for those of us who are in the executive branch and the office of Legal Counsel, legal opinion is binding to everyone within the executive branch. Two final questions and ill ask them together to give you the time to answer them both. What is your assessment of how intelligence operations in general are going to be impacted by this latest episode . When i said episode, im referring to the media circus, the political circus, the technical issues that are related to this whistleblower revelation . You alluded to it in some of your previous questions. I would like your assessment how this could impact intelligence operations in the future. And i believe this is your first time testifying to congress in your position, right . And i would welcome in the end, this is a little off topic. What do you see are the greatest challenges and threats to this country as director of National Intelligence . Let me answer the latter part of that. I think the greatest challenge that we face is not necessarily from kinetic strike with russia or china or iran or north korea. I think the greatest challenge we have is to maintain the integrity of our election system. We know now there are foreign powers trying to get us to question the validity on whether or not our elections are valid. So first and foremost i think that protecting the sanctity of our election within the United States whether national, city, state, local is perhaps the most important job that we have with the Intelligence Community. Outside of that we do face significant threats. Number one not necessarily kinetic but cyber. We are building ships and weapons to do that but in my estimation the great competition with these countries is taking place right now and doing that in the cyber realm. My time is running out. The broader implications on intelligence operations on this current whistleblower situation. In light of this i have a lot of work as the leader of this community to do to reassure my to reassure that the Intelligence Community that, in fact, i am totally committed to the Whistleblower Program and i am absolutely, absolutely committed to protecting the anonymity of this individual as well as making sure that Michael Atkinson, who is our icig, continues to be able to do his job unfeted. But i think that with that i certainly have to be proactive in my communications with my team. I yield back the time. I may or may not have. Mr. Castro. Sandra youre listening to the director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire. The hearing will continue. Well take a break and be right back. 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In the transcript page 4 first paragraph third sentence, President Trump says the former ambassador from the United States, the woman, was bad news and the people she was dealing with in the ukraine were bad news. So i just want to let you know that. The other thing, there is a lot of talk about bidens son. That biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that. So whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution, etc. Do you have reason to doubt what the whistleblower has brought forward . Getting back into Michael Atkinsons determination on whether or not it was credible or urgent concern. At the dni it is not my place to insure it is credible. Thats the icigs job as the inspector. He has determined it is credible. My only trouble was that, in fact, it involved someone who is not in the Intelligence Community or in an organization under which i have authority and responsibility. Outside of that. Director maguire you agree it involved an issue of election szpir fearens and investigation of u. S. Persons including a former Vice President. If you had knowledge or the c. I. A. Had knowledge that a government was going to investigate or drum up an investigation against a former Vice President , would that not that wouldnt qualify as an intelligence matter . Would it qualify as an intelligence matter, yes or no. I dont mean to say its a hypothetical question, sir. Thats exactly whats in the transcript and what he is asking for. The complaint thats what the president is asking the president of the ukraine to do. He is asking the president of ukraine to investigate a former Vice President of the United States. Does that qualify as an intelligence matter that the c. I. A. Would want to know . The conversation was p by the president to the president of ukraine as you know. It is i am not i understand that that cannot be an ultimate shield against transparency. It cant be an ultimate shield against accountability. The president is not above the law. One thing that you havent told us is if your office or if the Inspector General is not able to investigate, who is able to investigate . Congressman, as i mentioned several times so far. Although it did not come to the committee, the complaint was referred to the Judicial Department for criminal investigation. This was not swept under the rug. I have one more question for you. Why did your office think you should appeal the igs determination about urgent concern to the doj . That has never been done before. Its never been done before. This is unprecedented that in the past there has never been a matter that the Inspector General has investigated that did not involve a member of the Intelligence Community or an organization that the director of national one last point i would make with respect to you keep saying the president is not part of the Intelligence Community. I believe he is. The president you agree has the ability to declassify any single intelligence document. Do you agree thats true . The president has original classification authority. How is that person outside of the Intelligence Community. He is the president of the United States above the entire executive branch. Thank you. Mr. Ratcliffe. Admiral, good to see you. You served in the navy 36 years, you commanded seal team 2 and retired as vice admiral of the navy, correct . Thats correct. Despite the fact that after that service you became acting dni, 23 days after the trump zelenskiy call and four days after the whistleblower made his or her complaint, you were subpoenaed before this committee after being publicly accused of committing a crime, correct . Yes, congressman. Chairman schiff wrote a letter september 13th accusing you of being a part of the unlawful cover up and the speaker of the house said not once, but twice, that you broke the law, that you committed a crime. She said the acting director of National Intelligence blocked him, meaning the icig, from disclosing the whistleblower complaint. This is a violation of the law. You were publicly accused of committing crime and falsely accused of committing a crime as you have so accurately related. You were required to follow not just an opinion of what the law is but the opinion from the Justice Department, an 11page opinion whether or not you were required by law to report the whistleblower complaint, correct . Thats right. That opinion says the question is whether such a complaint falls within the statutory definition of urgent concern that the law requires the dni to forward to the Intelligence Committee. We conclude that it does not. Did i read that accurately . I better have, right . Thats an opinion not from bill barr but from the department of justice ethics lawyers. Not political appointees but career officials that serve republicans and democrats, the ethics lawyers at the department of justice that determine that you did follow the law. So you were publicly accused and falsely accused and here today i havent heard anything close to an apology for that. Welcome to the house of representatives with democrats in charge. Let me turn to the matter that were here for. A lot of talk about this whistleblower complaint. The question is at this point given what we have why all the focus on this whistleblower, the best evidence of what President Trump said to president zelenskiy is a transcript of what President Trump said to president zelenskiy. Not casting aspersions on the whistleblowers good faith or their intent. But a second yand account of something someone didnt here isnt as good as the best evidence of what was said and the whistleblower is, in fact, wrong in numerous respects. I know everyone wont have time to read the whistleblowers complaint but the whistleblower says im deeply concerned, talking about the president , that there was a serious or flagrant problem, abuse or violation of the law. Whistleblower goes on to say i was not a direct witness to the events described. However, i found my colleagues accounts of this to be credible. And then talking about those accounts of which this whistleblower complaint is based on the whistleblower tells us the officials that i spoke with told me. And i was told that. And i learned from multiple u. S. Officials that. And white house officials told me that. And i also learned from multiple u. S. Officials that. In other words, all of this is second hand information, none of it is firsthand information. The whistleblower goes on to cite additional sources besides those second hand information. Those sources happen to include Mainstream Media, the soerlss that the whistleblower bases his complaints on include the Washington Post, new york times, politico, the hill, bloomberg, abc news and others, much like the steele dossier, the allegations in the whistleblowers complaints are based on third hand Mainstream Media sources rather than firsthand information. The whistleblower also appears to allege crimes not just against the president , but says with regard to this scheme to solicit interference from a form foreign country in the 2020 election that the president s personal lawyer, giuliani, is a central figure in this effort and attorney general barr appears to be involved as well. But buried in a footnote a couple of pages later the whistleblower admits i do not know the extent to which, if at all, mr. Giuliani is directly coordinating his efforts on the ukraine with attorney general barr. Attorney general does know. He issued a statement yesterday saying there was no involvement. My point in all of this is again the transcript is the best evidence of what we have and so the American People are clear what that transcript relates is legal communications, United States is allowed to solicit help from a Foreign Government in an ongoing criminal investigation, which is exactly what President Trump did in that conversation. So if the democrats are intent on impeaching the president for lawful conduct, be my guest. I yield back. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Director. Thank you for being here, sir, thank you very much for your service. I want to step back a little bit and kind of put into perspective what is at stake here. Obviously yesterday the white house released the transcript of that july 25th conversation between President Trump and president zelenskiy. And we now know that this phone call was indeed a part of the whistleblower complaint. Yesterday the chair at a press conference characterized the president s conversation in that call as a shakedown of the ukrainian leader. He was not suggesting it was a shakedown for either information or money but instead a shakedown for help to win a president ial election, which is coming up next year. So now lets fast rewind to may 7th of this year when f. B. I. Director Christopher Wray testified before the United States senate that and im quoting now, any public official or member of any campaign should immediately report to the f. B. I. Any conversations with foreign actors about, quote, influencing or interfering with our election. Director wray is, of course, the top cop in the United States of america. You agree with director wray, do you not, sir . Congressman heck, i do not disagree with director wray. Is that the same thing as you agree with him, sir . Yes, once again. It was referred to the f. B. I. Let me fast forward. Was it referred to the f. B. I. By the president who actually engaged in the conversation . No, it was not. Let me fast forward to june 13th, five weeks in advance of that when the chair of the federal Elections Commission made the following statement. Follow me, please. Let me make something 100 clear to the American Public. Anyone running for public office. It is illegal for any person to accept, solicit, or receive anything of value from a Foreign National in connection with the u. S. Election. This is not a novel concept. Election intervention from Foreign Governments has been considered unacceptable since the beginnings of our nation. Do you agree with the fec chair wine tribe, mr. Director . I agree our elections are sacred and any interference from an outside source is not what we want. To solicit or accept it is illegal. Im not a lawyer. I dont mean to be evasive but i cant you think it is okay for a public official or may be okay. You dont know the law in this regard. You think it may be okay for a candidate or elected official to solicit foreign interference in our election. I cannot believe you are saying that. You arent really saying that right. Im not saying that congressman heck, at all. We should note the chair was prompted to say this because it was just literally the day before that the president of the United States sat at the resolute desk in the most iconic room in the United States, the oval office, and said that f. B. I. Director wray was wrong. You are obviously disagreeing with that. He said he would consider accepting foreign help and of course yesterday we learned that the president did in fact did in fact do exactly that. Solicited that help. Director, whether its this president or any president , do you believe it is okay for the president of the United States to pressure a foreign country into helping him or her win an election . Congressman heck i believe no one is above the law and we discussed what we think applies to the law. It is illegal to solicit. I cant answer that. I cant reconcile your two statements. Is it okay for a president to pressure any president , to pressure a Foreign Government for help to win an election. It is unwarranted. It is unwelcome. It is bad for the nation to have outside interference by any foreign power. By extension it would be equally unacceptable to extort that assistance as well. I mean, all i know is that i have the transcripts as you have. I have the whistleblower complaint as you have. I wasnt referring to the whistleblower complaint but if any president were to do this. I accept your answer. I think its beyond unacceptable, director. I think its wrong. I think we all know it. I think we were taught this at a very young age. There is a voice within most of us, evidently not all of us. It is illegal and wrong. Thank you sir, i yield back. If i may just answer once again no, youve got you may answer. Go ahead. Once again, it was referred to the federal bureau of investigation. Not by the president. No, by this office and by the office of ic. Director wray said any candidate or elected official should immediately report it. He didnt say the director of dni report it. The person involved did not do what director wray said should occur period. Thank you, congressman. Bill once again a quick oneminute break here, 60 seconds. Sandra the congressman from vermont is now questioning. The extraordinary document that came to your attention. The dni has jurisdiction over foreign interference in our elections, correct . Thats correct. Of course, you are aware as we all are of the Mueller Report and his indictments against 12 Foreign Nationals u russians, who actively interfered in our collection, correct . I have read the report. It is a huge responsibility that your agency has, correct . And in this case, because of the two things you mentioned that the president is the one person that is above the Intelligence Community and your sense about executive privilege you did not forward the complaint to us, correct . I did not yes, congressman welch, because i was still working with the white house. I understand that. Youve been very clear on that. Let me just ask a hypothetical to show the dill emma that you were in. Lets say a u. S. Senator who was well connected or private citizen well connected had access to and had a conversation as a result of that with the leader of a foreign country and asked that person for a favor. The u. S. Senator, lets say, providing dirt on a political opponent. Is that something that you would see that should be forwarded to this committee . Congressman, i dont mean to be disrespectful it is very difficult to answer hypothetical questions. Im not sure i understand. I wont make it hypothetical. Instead of being a conversation between the president and the president of ukraine. It was a u. S. Senator head of the Foreign Relations committee and asking for the foreign leader. So would you forward that to our committee . Sir, once again i mentioned that a little bit earlier in our conversation that the United States senator is not a member of the Intelligence Community and the director of National Intelligence does not have the authority and responsibility for the u. S. Senate. So any wrongdoing in that regard should be referred to the department of justice for criminal investigation. I would respectfully disagree with you. That would be a solicitation by that u. S. Senator for interference in our elections and thats in your jurisdiction, correct . Election interference, yes, congressman welch. But once again although it is, as far as what the legal responsibility to do in compliance with the intelligence reform act, the whistleblower protection act, it does not the statute does not allow for that to be done. I disagree with that. Here is the dilemma that were in but now be able to follow up because executive privilege if it existed was waived. Under your approach as you saw it, it means that no one would be investigating the underlying conduct because in this case executive privilege applies or may apply and number two, the president who had the conversation is above the law. Thats a dilemma for a democracy, is it not . The complaint was sent to the federal bureau of investigation. Totally disregarding any concern for executive privilege. The federal bureau of investigation never did an followup investigation, right . I believe theyve concluded the investigation. Im not sure being involved with this matter here i also have other pressing matters. And the Justice Department led by mr. Barr who is the subject of the complaint, is the department that provided the opinion that there is no action to be taken. I believe that the attorney general was mentioned in the complaint, not necessarily subject of the complaint, sir. He was mentioned. Yes, sir. I yield back. Thank you. Mr. Maloney. Director maguire, what was your first day on the job . My first day on the job was friday the 16th of august and ip think i set a new record to the administration for being subpoenaed. You had a heck of a first week. The complaint is dated august 12th. Whatever else youve done right in your career your timing has got to be something you worry about. I think dan coates timing is better than mine. There has been a lot of talk about the process. I just want to summarize a couple of things if thats okay. So in your first couple days on the job, sir, you are hit with this complaint and it says that the president of the United States pressured a foreign leader to help him investigate a political opponent and that political opponents son, in fact. That the president asked the foreign leader to work with a private citizen, mr. Giuliani and the attorney general of the United States, bill barr, on that scheme. The president at that time not in dispute was withholding 391 million of assistance holding that over that ukrainian president s head. That ukrainian president raises in the conversation u. S. Military systems. Javelins. He has Russian Troops in his country. The wolff is at the door. The president asks for a flavor. Complains about ukrainian reciprocity. Not getting enough from you. Thats what reciprocity is. We have to get something from you if were giving something to you. He names the political opponents by name, the bidens. Ukrainian president says he will do it. He will do the investigation. Thats what you are hit with. And you look at that complaint that in the second paragraph alleges serious wrongdoing by the president of the United States and the first thing you do is go to the president s man at the white house and women and say should i give it to congress . And in the second paragraph of that complaint, sir, it also suggests the attorney general to be involved and the second thing you do is go to the attorney generals people at the Justice Department and ask them if you should give it to congress. Sir, i have no question about your character. Ive read your bio. I have some questions about your decision. And the judgment in those decisions. Do you see any conflicts here . Congressman maloney, i have a lot of leadership experience. As you said, it came to me very early on in this. The fact that i was just i am the acting dni and i was still using garmin to get to work. This came to my attention involving the president of the United States. And the important matter of this. In the past as i said before i have always worked with Legal Counsel. Because of the magnitude of this decision, i just sir, as a naval officer for years, i just thought it would be prudent. I also want to say sir, if i may. My life would have been a lot simpler without becoming the most famous man in the United States. When you were considering prudence did you think it was prudent to give a veto power over whether the congress saw this serious allegation of wrongdoing to the two people implicated by it. Is that prudent . I have to work with the situation as it is, congressman maloney. Only the white house could determine or waive executive privilege. There is no one else to go to. As far as a Second Opinion, my only avenue of that was to go to the the department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel. You understand, sir, if unchallenged by your own Inspector General your decision, that prudence would have prevented these sear us a allegations from reaching the congress. I think you left the door open you spoke to the president of the United States about this whistleblower complaint. Sir, did you speak personally to the president of the United States at any time about this complaint . Congressman, once again i am the president s intelligence officer. I speak to the president. I cannot say one way or the other. I know you speak to the president a lot. A simple question, sir. Did you speak to him about this whistleblower complaint yes or no . My conversation with the president of the United States is privileged. You are not denying you spoke to the president. I dont want the content. Did you or did you not speak to the president about this whistleblower complaint . I speak to the president about a lot of things and anything that i say to the president of the United States in any form is privileged. Not asking for the content. Are you denying you spoke to the president. I speak to the president and anything i say to the president is confidential. Thank you, sir. Thats the way it is. Understand, thank you. Director you understand were not asking about your conversations with the president about National Security, about Foreign Policy, about the National Counter Terrorism Center. We want to know did you discuss this subject with the president. You can imagine what a profound conflict of interest that would be. Did you discuss this subject, this whistleblower complaint with the president. You can say i did not discuss it with him. If thats the answer. That doesnt betray any privilege. And you can say i did discuss it with him but im not going to get into the content of those conversations. That question you can answer. Chairman schiff, once again my conversation no matter what the subject is with the president of the United States is privileged conversation between the director of National Intelligence and the president. Thank you so much, mr. Chairman, and director maguire, thank you for being here with us today. Thank you for your service. I know you said that you took your first oath in 1974. Thats a long time but a long time to be proud of the service. I took my first oath in 1984 when i was sworn in as a Law Enforcement officer. I thank you so much for saying that Public Service is a sacred trust because regardless of the circumstances or who is involved, Public Service is a sacred trust. Ive had an opportunity as a Law Enforcement officer, member of congress, to investigate internal cases involving other personnel and had an opportunity to investigate numerous other cases, criminal cases, never once just for the record, director maguire, did i ever go to the suspect or the defendant or the principal in those cases to ask them what i should do in the case. There has been a lot of talk this morning the whole discussion, the whole reason why were here centers around the u. S. Relationship with ukraine. I think you would agree that ukraine is very dependent on the United States in terms of assisting them and defending themselves. Could you based on your many years of experience in the military and now in your new position talk a little bit about that relationship and how important it is for the United States to assist ukraine if they are ever going to be able to defend themselves . Yes, congressman. I think the United States has been extremely supportive of ukraine. I would say that they are relying on us as they rely on other people in europe. And i would also say that the United States is probably paying more of their fair share for the support of ukraine than the others. The threats are real for the ukrainian people and the stake of freedom and democracy is also even though its in the ukraine is also very much a concern. Based on that you would say ukraine could probably never get there without the support and assistance of the United States or from the United States of america. I would say if others were willing to step up and support they might be able to get there. But they are not. Were there. I think youve said it would be difficult for ukraine to meet that goal of defending themselves without our support, correct. I would say it would be a challenge, yes. This complaint outlines a scheme by the president of the United States im not to sure what to call Rudy Giuliani these days, maybe the new fixer. It involves a scheme to coerce ukraine, the country that you say is so dependent on the United States to defend themselves to coerce ukraine into assisting the president s reelection efforts in 2020. In the report from your Inspector General, the memo that was sent to you, it says on july 18th the office of management and budget official informed the departments and agencies the president earlier that month had issued instructions to suspend all u. S. Security assistance to ukraine, neither omb or nfc staff knew why this instruction had been issued. During interagency meetings on the 23rd of july and 26th of july omb officials again stated explicitly the instruction to suspend this assistance had come directly from the president. But they were not they were still unaware of a policy rationale. The 23, 26, on the 18th this issue where the president was suspending that assistance that you said ukraine so desperately depends on. Director maguire we deal in whats reasonable here. I believe your Inspector General clued included that in the report because this issue is ukraines relationship with the United States. Their dependency on the United States and the president s efforts to have ukraine go into an illegal and improper investigation. Do you think thats why your Inspector General added that . I think he found it to be credible and viewed it was a matter of urgent concern to forward to this committee. Do you think its reasonable for the American People and this committee to believe there is a correlation or nexus between the president suspending the aid and the conversation that took place on the follow upconversation . Yes, thats the allegation that is made. I did not have access to the transcripts. My only information was the icigs cover letter and the allegation whistleblower allegation. The other information coming to light yesterday as released by the president changes things in a different light. Mr. Chairman may i ask one more quickly . My understanding is that the attorney Inspector General is a career intelligence person and received numerous awards for outstanding performance. Did you have any reason to deny or not believe his conclusions in every area of this report that he was directly involved in . Congresswoman, Michael Atkinson is a valued and trusted colleague and i respect him tremendously. The question came down to as we over and over again urgent concern and whether or not the Intelligence Community, whistleblower protection act as written allows me to forward it to this committee. Thats where i got stuck, maam, and im sorry. Mr. Maguire, thank you so much for your service to our country. Thank you for your patriotism. I want to ask you a couple questions about the time surrounding july 25th to the time that you came into office at the dni. The phone call between President Trump and the ukrainian president happened july 25th of this year, correct . I believe july 25th. At least one of them happened july 25th. At that time the dni was dan coates and his deputy was sue gordon. The whistleblower claim was filed on august 12th of this year and you took office on august 16th, four days later. Prior to taking your new job or since, did you discuss the july 25th call or the whistleblower complaint with dni coates . I wouldnt have taken the job if i did. No, sir, how about with sue gordon . To the best of my ability i dont think either director coates or our Principal Deputy sue gordon have any sense whatsoever about this whistleblower complaint or that Michael Atkinson had it. Before your current role did you discuss ukraine with President Trump . I havent discussed ukraine with anybody. Let me put it to you that way. You havent discussed ukraine with anybody in your current role as the acting dni. Intelligence reports. We have 190 countries out there. Whatever the president s daily brief in and matters that pertain to that. As far as intelligent equities in the region now this hasnt been something that has come to my attention in the six weeks that ive been the acting dni. Turning to the whistleblower and Inspector General, you dont know the identity of the whistleblower, right . I do not and made it my business to make sure i dont. You dont know his political affiliation. I dont know this individual. Or her political affiliation and believe the whistleblower was operating in good faith and without bias. I do not know about that. I do believe you have no reason to believe they were acting with bias, correct . I believe the whistleblower was acting in good faith. No reason to believe the person was biased. I would not know that. I just dont know. You will do everything you can to protect the whistleblower from any attempts to retaliate against him or her, correct . I will not permit the whistleblower to be subject to retaliation or adverse consequences for going to the i. G. Unlike the whistleblower you know the inspect for general. I hold him in high esteem. He also operated in the highest faith, right . I believe that Michael Atkinson, yes. Interestingly, mr. Atkinson was actually appointed by president donald trump, right . Yes, he was. He is a president ial appointee. What lends real credibility to the whistleblowers complaint is the fact that mr. Atkinson, an appointee of the president , would actually bring forward a complaint against his boss and that is something that is especially courageous. What i want to hear from you is that you will also do everything you can to protect mr. Atkinson from potential retaliation. Congressman, absolutely. Very good. The white house released a memorandum of telephone conversation from the july 25th, 2019 call, right . I believe thats what was transmitted yesterday morning, sir. They call it a tellcon in the jargon of these memoranda, is that right . This is the first time ive ever seen the transcript of a president ial conversation with a foreign leader. It would be short for telephone conversation. Have you been a part to a conversation between the president and a foreign leader on a phone call . When i am in the office to provide the intelligence briefs to the president some foreign heads of state might call in. The president may either ask us to leave or stay there for a brief call from time to time, yes, sir. And there are notetakers who scribble down furiously what is being said on those calls. If theyre notetakers they wouldnt be in the oval office with us. They might be listening somewhere else. Like from the situation room. I dont know. Somewhere within the white house, yes. And within this particular situation, maybe more than a dozen people were on the phone call. Thats the allegation. All taking notes presumably. If they are good Public Servants, yes, congressman. And were you ever a party to a call where the notes that you took were then given to someone at the white house for keeping . I have never been party to any call other than my own. I would take notes for my own at my level or as the director of National Counter Terrorism Center but never been privy to a conversation of the president where i would be involved taking notes. It would be happenstance. I happened to be there and he felt comfortable enough to leave me for a brief conversation. Not anything that i would be in that service particularly for that matter. Thank you for your service. Thank you, i would like to recognize the Ranking Member for any final questions he would have. Thank you, mr. Chair. Mr. Maguire, i want to thank you for your tenants here today. Congratulations for surviving legal word challenge charade today. I expect hopefully we will see you behind closed doors, like this is supposed to be done. I would urge my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, if they would like to impeach the president , they need to go to the floor of the house and actually call for a vote. The Intelligence Committee is not an appropriate place to try articles of impeachment. So there is a process in the constitution that i would advise you all follow. In the meantime, director speed 11 dont act on x11, i want to apologize to you for being accused of crimes they have not committed. It is totally inappropriate behavior for anyone to accuse someone that has served four decades like you. Hope you do not have to go through this any longer. With that, i yield back the balance of my time. Thank you, i appreciate that, sir. Director, i have a few more questions. Just to followup, because i thought i heard you say a moment ago that you had no communication with the president on the subject of ukraine. Did i understand you to say that . I have not particularly had any conversation with anyone on the subject of ukraine that didnt deal with the matter that we have right now in regard to the whistleblower complaint. Not particularly with the office of Legal Counsel, as far as mentioning the ukraine, or as far as the Justice Department. All i did was send the documents forward, the allegations are in their, and i just love the documents speak for themselves. So you are saying you did not have any conversation on the subject of ukraine that did not involved this complaint . That is correct, sir. Ive been the acting dni for six weeks. Im just trying to understand, because that is suggestive that you did have a conversation involving the complaint with the president. No, no. That is not what i said, sir. Okay. Director, you mentioned early on when we were on the subject of what the Inspector General was able to investigate or not investigate, whether the president is within the Intelligence Community or subject to the Intelligence Community. And, by the way, the statute does not require that the subject of the complaint be within the Intelligence Community. Requires the whistleblower to be an employee or detailing. It doesnt require that subject, the person complained of by the Intelligence Community. You have adopted an interpretation by the Justice Department that essentially says the president is above the director. Therefore, the president is not subject to the jurisdiction of the director. Therefore, it doesnt meet the definition of urgent concern. Therefore, the Inspector General is done. The Inspector General cant investigate anymore. Thats the Inspector Generals reading of the department opinion, that he is no longer allowed to investigate this. Is that youre reading, as well . Chairman, not necessarily the president , but the allegation has to relate to the operation of intelligence activity with the responsibility and the authority of the director of National Intelligence. Im just trying to get to whether the president is somehow beyond the reach of the law. No, sir. No person in this country is beyond the reach of the law. Speak about the way it should be, but im trying to figure out whether thats the way it is as a practical fact. The
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