Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Cotton’s Opening Remarks as Delivered at the Worldwide Threat Assessment Hearing

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) today delivered the below opening statement at the Intelligence Committee's annual Worldwide Threat Assessment hearing. Below are his remarks as delivered.

Senator Cotton: Good morning. I call this hearing to order. Welcome to the Senate's annual Worldwide Threats Assessment hearing. Let me begin by welcoming our esteemed panel of witnesses: Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard; CIA Director John Ratcliffe; FBI Director Kash Patel; Acting Director of the National Security Agency and Commander of U.S. Cyber Command Lieutenant General William Hartman; and DIA Director Lieutenant General James Adams.

Thank you all for your appearance today and for your service. I also want to offer a special thanks to General Hartman, who is about to enter a well-earned and well-deserved retirement. General, on behalf of the committee, thank you for your lifetime of service to our nation.

I'd first like to take this opportunity to commend the thousands of men and women in our intelligence agencies whom our witnesses represent. Our intelligence professionals are second to none. Because of their service, their dedication, and their sacrifice, Americans are safer at home and around the world. But because of the nature of their work, grateful Americans don't buy their lunch at restaurants or even have a chance to say thank you. So, on their behalf, let me simply say, thank you.

I want to make two basic points this morning.

First, the world is always a dangerous place, especially for America. But thanks to your agencies and President Trump's leadership, the world isn't quite as dangerous for Americans as it was a year ago.

Thanks to the efforts of our military and intelligence personnel-including my fellow Arkansans who are now serving in the Middle East-the Iranian revolutionary regime that terrorized the world for forty-seven years is finally knocked on its back foot. Last summer, we devastated Iran's nuclear facilities. And in recent weeks, we've eliminated Iran's top leadership, pummeled its military, sunk its navy, destroyed its missiles, neutered its proxies, and left its economy reeling. After forty-seven years of indecision and timidity, America has finally put our foot down.

I'm also pleased to report that things have improved a lot in our own backyard now that Venezuela's illegitimate communist dictator, Nicolás Maduro, is rotting in a New York prison. Only the United States could execute a military and intelligence operation of this difficulty without a single American life lost.

Our military is awesome, but these operations wouldn't have succeeded-and they probably wouldn't have even been tried-without timely, accurate, and fact-based intelligence from your agencies. These successful operations are a testament to our intelligence professionals' ability to expose and uncover critical details about America's enemies. So let this be a warning to those who wish America harm: we leave no stone unturned, and there's no one or no thing close to you that might not betray you.

Today's hearing is an opportunity for the American people to hear an unvarnished and unbiased account of the remaining threats we face. From Communist China, North Korea, and Russia to the east, to narco-terrorist cartels here at home, these threats truly do span the globe.

And for my second point: your agencies have improved over the last year thanks to reforms that have gotten them back to basics. Of course, my two points are related. When our intelligence agencies return to their core mission-stealing the secrets of our adversaries to deliver timely and needful intelligence-America is safer for it.

These efforts are already bearing fruit. For example, last year the CIA increased its foreign-intelligence reporting by 25 percent. This year, the CIA is on track to hire and deploy more officers than at any point in the last quarter century. While I am greatly encouraged by the progress, more remains to be done.

We must always equip our intelligence personnel with the tools they need to do their jobs well and execute their missions. That's why I fully support President Trump's request for a clean reauthorization of FISA Section 702. And it's why I expect a healthy intelligence budget request in the administration's supplemental appropriations request to fund operations against Iran and narco-terrorists. No doubt our military needs supplemental funding, but our intelligence agencies need it just as badly.

Moreover, I urge each of you to continue to make personnel and institutional reforms that will cement these changes and foreclose a return in the future to bureaucratic bloat, political bias, and excessive caution within your services.

When I became chairman, I promised real reform across the entire intelligence community. Our first Intelligence Authorization Act set the foundation for a more efficient intelligence community by, for example, reorganizing the ODNI, improving the security of CIA installations, and directing resources toward foreign intelligence collection and covert action.

This year, I look forward to going further, namely, by growing our cadre of collectors, making generational investments in core capabilities, providing new capabilities to defend our space assets, and further codifying reforms to guard against any future return of bloated and biased bureaucracy.

I look forward to working with you toward these ends.

I now recognize the Vice Chairman.

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