Dan Coats: “The purpose of the authority is to give the United States intelligence community the upper hand in trying to avert these…”

I would argue that ours is not working very well and it is--at the moment.

I know others have talked about that here today, but when you and I had a chance to talk earlier in the last couple weeks, I mentioned one of my real concerns about China.

One of the first things you can do--at this hearing, even--is to make a strong statement of support for professionalism in the IC and pledge that you will not tolerate politics influencing the analytical process.

You'll need to demonstrate to the American people that the Intelligence Community deserves their utmost confidence as a source of truth and insight.