How a director of national intelligence helps a president stay on top of threats from around the world
In all the arguments over whether President-elect Donald Trump’s choice for director of national intelligence is fit for the job, it’s easy to lose sight of why it matters.
It matters a lot. To speak of telling truth to power seems terribly old-fashioned these days, but as a veteran of White House intelligence operations, I know that is the essence of the job.
The director of national intelligence is the president’s principal adviser on intelligence, though the CIA director has remained somewhat co-equal in that role. The director of national intelligence is responsible for both the President’s Daily Brief, where the most crucial and sophisticated intelligence is presented, and for the work of the National Intelligence Council. Most of the President’s Daily Brief items are still done by the CIA, but the director of national intelligence or their deputy briefs the president, daily in most administrations but one or two times a week in the first Trump administration.