be a conference room there for anybody that would like to sit, read intelligence products, listen to what's going on in the closed hearing and then come in for their questioning period. with that, i recognize senator blunt. >> thank you, chairman. congressman ratcliffe, it's good to have you here. this job has gone vacant for too long. it's a critically important jock, i'm glad you've been nominated. i've read with great interest the letter in the record that was given to us from former attorney general ashcroft. he's been a good friend of mine for a long time. i trust his judgment. i know you worked with him as a u.s. attorney and also in a law firm that was formed after you both left the justice department and his view of you, which he shared with me personally, as well as in this letter is significant. we've had a chance to visit

about your work on the house intelligence committee and i particularly appreciated your last comment about the importance of being fully open and an oversight committee like this one being fully informed. >> we'll return to our marathon of trump nominees in their own word. right now fulfill our 45-year commitment, gavel to gavel coverage of the u.s. senate which is meeting this morning for a brief session.

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the u.s. senate. no votes are on the floor of the chamber, and instead they'll hold brief sessions until january 3rd when the 118th congress will gavel out and the 119th congress will begin. you're watching live coverage of the u.s. senate.

>> a couple of days away from christmas and waiting for the nonlegislative session for the u.s. senate to get underway today. we understand senator tammy duckworth is set to preside this morning and learning that she's still a few minutes away from arriving in the chamber. live coverage of the senate pro forma session this morning here on c-span2.

still waiting for the start of what we expect to be a brief session today and remarks and appearances from the trump nominees. here is president-elect trump's choice to join the fbi, and jonathan ratcliffe, this is in 2020 before the senate intelligence commute. would you believe that was okay. >> no, thank you, mr. chairman. congressman ratcliffe, congratulations for your

nomination. he asked if you'd seen any intelligence that intelligence had started in wuhan, in a seafood market in wuhan. >> no. >> i'm sure you're aware they published in january that concluded in fact, it did not originate in the market? >> i have. >> more than a third of the original cases had no contacts with the market whatsoever and include what they believe to be the first known case as well. >> i didn't recall that, but if that's what that reflects. >> are you aware that to the best of our knowledge there's no evidence that bats of any kind to include the horseshoe bat was even sold in the market. >> that is my understanding. so, this -- just to be clear, just the point i was trying to make, it's been a while and through no one's fault, since i've had an updated classified

briefing regarding the currents pandemic. >> i understand and i'm asking these questions not just to speak about the virus, but more intelligence analysis and everything that we just discussed is not clandestined, collected information, it's not a national resources like the lancet. much of what we know about the virus is a result of publicly recorded information or evidence from wuhan in the early days and so forth. how critical is the role of that kind of unclassified public information and analysis? >> i think it's vitally important. one of the things we're seeing is open source intelligence is increasingly valuable and we need to make sure that we're collecting and analyzing it, it's huge, it's large sets of

data that we need to be processing there so it's a challenge, but it's a tremendous source of information and should be utilized by the intelligence community going forward. >> i couldn't agree more. i think there's always a bias towards thinking if the secret is not stolen through clandestine means it's not valuable information when all of these pieces of information, what we're talking about the chinese coronavirus or what russia is up to in europe or iran's nuclear program stitched together into a mosaic and that is usually a question of circumstancesal evidence you can just common sense, not direct evidence or-- do you want to respond? >> i was going to say, an example of how we might forward looking on this issue, open source intelligence. if used open source intelligence tools we may be able to get

earlier warnings around pandemics like this or viruses like this, as they're beginning. so those are the types of, when i was referring to how the intelligence community can leverage open source information, that's what i was referring to. >> now, moving on to one of the director of national intelligence chief responsibilities, setting priorities for the intelligence that our nation needs to collect, last week the director of national intelligence released a statement saying the intelligence community will continue to rigorously examine the information and intelligence to determine whether outbreak came through contact with animals or an accident at a laboratory in wuhan. the new york times subsequently reported that senior national security council officials urged the intelligence community to collect additional information to the extent possible on the origin and cause of the wuhan

pandemic. the new york times, another media outlets somehow suggested that was inappropriate. is it inappropriate for the president to set collection priorities on what he thinks is urgent national questions and u.s. dni to drive those priorities as best you can given the fact that our intelligence officers are able to gather? >> that would be appropriate. >> i think that would be completely and totally appropriate. that's exactly what we would expect the cabinet or the president and his senior national security cabinet members to do. one final question i have, i've heard a lot of questions about this on both sides today. you're obl a politician right now, you've got an r after your name and some people raised the question whether you can separate politics from intelligence. we've discussed in the past that this has been done successfully at times, if you look at someone like leon panetta, a pretty partisan by when he was in the

congress and bill clinton's chief of staff, but was an outstanding director of the central intelligence agency. if you look at it the other way, bob gates, life long intelligence professional, but since he's left the government it's clear he's a republican, he's supported republican candidates for office since i got out of office even though he served in a democratic administration. just want to point out, even those are not the dni job, but the director of central intelligence job, they have a similar need for separating politics from intelligence and this is something that can be done and that has been done in the past and i wanted to see if you have comments about those precedents or how you'll separate politics from intelligence. >> well, i appreciate the question, senator and earlier i talked about the fact that i very much love representing the people here in congress, but i held an apolitical job before as

u.s. attorney one where i represented the united states and neither party and kept both parties out of everything that i did. and so i have done that and done it successfully and been highly regarded for the way that i've approached that and i enjoyed that and it's one of the reasons that i'm going from a safe district and asking you all to consider me as the nominee. i have every-- not just every intention, but every confidence that i will do exactly as i'm telling you, that i will be entirety apolitical as the director of national intelligence. >> thank you very much. >> senator ernst. >> thank you, mr. chairman. congressman, the u.s. intelligence community has an important role in warning our leader about pandemics like covid-19, not just a health matter, but a matter of national security.

based on reporting alone, do you believe that president trump has accurately conveyed the severity of the threat of covid-19 to the american people? >> are you saying presently? >> we are in the midst of the pandemic presently, correct. >> so repeat the question because i guess i'm misunderstanding. i'm sorry. has he accurately reflected the status of the pandemic. >> conveyed the severity of the pandemic, yes, as he accurately conveyed the severity of covid-19 to the american people? >> i believe so. >> you do. and according to an ip 27th, 2020, washington post article, president trump received upwards of a dozen briefings on covid-19 from the u.s. intelligence agencies between january and february of this year during which time he repeatedly denied the severity of the threat. on january 22nd, he said, quote, we have it totally under

control. on february 22nd, or 26th, he insisted that the number of cases would be, quote, close to zero within a number of days. as recently as march 10th the president stated, quote, just stay calm, it will go away. and i'm sure you're familiar with the recent reports today we may see as many as 3,000 deaths a day in america because of covid-19.

live pictures from a fairly empty chamber holding a pro forma session. usually holding to avoid recess appointments. the presiding officer: the senate will come to order. the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c.,december 23, 2024. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable tammy duckworth, a senator from the state of illinois, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: patty murray, president pro tempore. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until 2:30 p.m., december 26, 2024. no votes today in the u.s. senate or for that matter the rest of the year. instead the chambers will hold the brief sessions until january 3rd when the 118th congress will gavel out for the last time and the new congress will begin.

as always live coverage of the senate here on c-span2. we return now to our week long marathon of trump nominees in their own words already in progress. >> benefitting then candidate trump's political campaign. however you and other allies of the president sought to cast doubt on the consensus conclusions raising concerns for many of us about your ability to be unbiased, which is a necessity to head the dni. will you accept the intelligence provided to you by the men and women of the intelligence community no matter your personal beliefs and do you accept the findings of the intelligence committee, community as it relates to the russian interference in the 2016 presidential election? >> so to your first question, i will accept to the second question about specific to the russia, 2017. >> 2016. >> i'm sorry, 2016, earlier in the--