President Donald Trump said Sunday that he has not yet decided who to nominate to be the next director of national intelligence.
“We have four or five people that are great – very respected. In the meantime we have our ambassador to Germany who is a very smart person and he’s doing a very good job,” he told reporters at the White House.
Trump was referring to Richard Grenell, the current ambassador to Germany who took over last week also as the acting director of national Intelligence after his predecessor, Joseph Maguire, left the post.
Trump, who has said Grenell is only filling the job temporarily until a permanent nomination is made, refused on Sunday to say who was on the list for the position. He said that he would be announcing it, but didn’t say when the announcement would come.
Trump also added that he would be appointing a new ambassador to Germany.
Trump said Maguire’s time as the intelligence director was up, referring to the fact that because he was serving in an acting capacity, the law mandated he could only stay in the position until early March.
“He’s a very nice man, his time came up,” Trump said of Maguire. “So he had to leave on March 11.”
Maguire, who was appointed as acting DNI in August 2019, formally resigned from US government service last week after Trump made it clear he would not be nominated for the full-time intelligence chief job.
Maguire and Trump had a contentious meeting last week after Trump found out about a briefing given by an official in Maguire’s office to the House Intelligence Committee. Members were told in that briefing that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election in order to benefit Trump, sources have previously told CNN.
Trump became infuriated after he only learned about the briefing after it took place from Rep. Devin Nunes, the ranking Republican on the panel and a close ally of the President, and not from someone in the Director of National Intelligence Office, sources confirmed to CNN.
CNN’s Zachary Cohen contributed to this report.
