Jay Clayton Sworn In as DNI, Ending Bill Pulte's 30% Cut of the Spy Office

Jay Clayton was sworn in as director of national intelligence on Monday, according to the New York Post, taking the job from acting director Bill Pulte a full two weeks earlier than the two men had originally planned.

The Senate confirmed Clayton 51-47 the previous Tuesday, with zero Democrats voting yes, according to NOTUS. The original plan, officials told the Post, was to give Pulte until mid-August to finish his cuts at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence while Clayton wrapped up his work as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and relocated to Washington. That plan got scrapped over the weekend.

"After speaking with President Trump and Jay Clayton, we have decided the DNI transition will take place this coming Monday," Pulte wrote on X, according to the Post. Neither Pulte nor the White House gave a public reason for moving the handoff up.

Pulte leaves after five rounds of cuts

Pulte took over as acting DNI on June 19, replacing Tulsi Gabbard, who stepped down to care for her husband, Abraham Williams, as he battles a rare form of bone cancer, according to ClearanceJobs. Her resignation was announced May 22 and took effect June 30.

In about six weeks running the office, Pulte pushed through five rounds of layoffs, according to ClearanceJobs and the Washington Examiner. He announced the fourth round on Sunday, one day before Clayton's confirmation vote, describing the cuts as done "smartly" and "carefully" and aimed at "re-focusing ODNI on national security, the law, and the statute," per his post cited by the Washington Examiner.

ODNI had roughly 1,800 to 2,000 employees when Trump took office, the Examiner reported. Gabbard had already cut 500 to 700 positions under her ODNI 2.0 restructuring plan, launched in August 2025 with a target of a 30-40% workforce reduction. Pulte's rounds piled on top of that, and the Post reports the combined total under Pulte hit roughly 30% between outright layoffs and sending detailed staff back to their home agencies. Neither Pulte nor ODNI disclosed exact headcounts for the later rounds.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) has argued for capping ODNI at 650 full-time staff and pushing most personnel back to their home agencies to do "real intelligence work" instead of "bureaucratic make-work," a position ClearanceJobs notes predates Pulte's tenure. That's the strongest case for the cuts. ODNI was created in 2004 to fix information-sharing gaps exposed by 9/11, and critics on both sides of the aisle have argued for two decades that it became a redundant, bloated coordination layer rather than a lean fix.

The counterargument, raised by Senate Democrats including Mark Warner of Virginia, is that Pulte had zero intelligence or national security background, having previously run the Federal Housing Finance Agency and overseen mortgage entities Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Democrats have alleged, per NOTUS, that Pulte used FHFA records for politically targeted investigations during his time there. That allegation has not resulted in any charges or announced investigation and remains a Democratic claim, not an established fact.

Clayton's rocky path and the FISA logjam

Clayton's confirmation wasn't smooth. He lost all Democratic support after refusing, during hearings roughly two weeks before his confirmation, to say plainly that Joe Biden won the 2020 election, according to NOTUS and the Washington Examiner. That answer also unsettled some Senate Republican centrists, per the Examiner's reporting.

Even so, Warner voted no but called Clayton's arrival "a vast improvement" and said Clayton "said what I wanted to hear in terms of the importance of classification of information and speaking truth to power," according to NOTUS.

Senate Democrats have blocked reauthorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act since mid-June specifically over concerns about Pulte's leadership, NOTUS reported. FISA authority reportedly underpins more than 60% of the president's daily intelligence briefing. Several senators on the Intelligence Committee told NOTUS they're ready to vote on reauthorization now that Clayton is sworn in, though Warner said the rush is less urgent than Democrats initially believed.

On his first day, Clayton said he's looking "forward to leading an organization and community that is streamlined, agile, team-oriented, and mission-focused," according to the Post. Trump, asked Sunday what he wanted Clayton to prioritize, told reporters: "I want him to do what he wants to do. He's outstanding," giving no specific directive on whether the layoffs continue.

ClearanceJobs reported it remains unclear whether additional workforce reductions are coming under Clayton. The immediate test: whether Senate Democrats move to reauthorize FISA now that Pulte is out, and whether Clayton signals to Cotton and other Republicans that he'll hold ODNI's headcount near the 650-person target or let it drift back up.