President Trump Nominates John Ratcliffe for Director of National Intelligence - Ramifications(Good Read) From the Conservative Treehouse: Quite a bit to unpack here, and most of it is very good news.  First, this re-nomination was almost predictable when you look at the totality of the landscape: President Trump needed to generate an official DNI nomination in order to retain the current acting DNI authorities for Richard “Ric” Grenell; so that’s one aspect. However, beyond the procedural move there’s the larger background of the FISA reauthorization; and, in my opinion, that larger dynamic is the majority consideration. The FISA reauthorization and the need for President Trump to support any type of reauthorization that eventually gets through the complex political dynamics within congress; and considering Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell traveled to the White House to discuss this issue yesterday; the outcome is considerable leverage for Trump. On July 28, 2019, President Trump first nominated John Ratcliffe for the ODNI position to replace former DNI Dan Coats.  However, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence headed by Chairman Richard Burr and Vice-Chairman Mark Warner, informed the White House they would not support Ratcliffe.  Burr and Warner would not have made such a bold statement to undercut the nomination without approval from Mitch McConnell. . . https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/02/28/president-trump-nominates-john-ratcliffe-for-director-of-national-intelligence-ramifications/