President Trump bigfooted Senate Republicans into postponing a confirmation hearing for Jay Clayton, the nominee to be director of national intelligence, in a convoluted effort to push his stalled election integrity bill.
Mr. Clayton was scheduled to appear before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on Wednesday afternoon, but Mr. Trump said in the morning that the hearing must be canceled.
“Republicans fell into a trap” by agreeing to speed through Mr. Clayton’s confirmation without getting anything in return, the president said on social media.
He laid out a series of demands, including leveraging Mr. Clayton’s nomination and the renewal of a lapsed spy authority to pass the Republicans’ election integrity bill, the SAVE America Act.
Republican congressional leaders had already rebuffed Mr. Trump’s plan to tie the election bill to the spy law. They must now decide how far to go in pushing back against the president.
Mr. Trump told reporters Republicans can send him the SAVE America Act “any way they want to pass it, but I’m not going to sign FISA unless it’s done.”
He was referring to legislation reauthorizing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a law that allows the government to spy on foreign targets’ communications without a warrant.
The spy authority lapsed Friday as Democrats filibustered short- and long-term FISA extensions.
Democrats are protesting Mr. Trump’s appointment of William J. Pulte to serve as acting director of national intelligence as Tulsi Gabbard exits the role to help her husband through cancer treatment.
Republicans thought they could unlock the Democratic votes needed to renew FISA by quickly confirming Mr. Clayton for the permanent role.
Mr. Trump’s delay of Mr. Clayton’s confirmation and use of FISA as leverage to pass the SAVE America Act threatens to extend the impasse over a key intelligence tool used to thwart terrorist plots.
Republicans, however, are not convinced Mr. Trump will follow through on his threat.
“I don’t know that he wouldn’t sign FISA,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, South Dakota Republican. “I know he said that, but he’s said that about a lot of other things.”
Mr. Thune said he still holds the FISA lapse and its potential consequences against Democrats, not Mr. Trump.
“The Democrats playing politics with something like this to me is inexcusable,” Mr. Thune said. “Is this a complicating factor? Yeah. But it still, in my view, does not give them any justification or rationale for turning the lights off of FISA, which is a critically important national security tool.”
Democrats argue that it is Mr. Trump who has been undermining national security for political reasons, starting with naming Mr. Pulte as acting director.
Lawmakers in both parties have complained that Mr. Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, lacks national security experience.
Democrats are also concerned that Mr. Pulte could use his intelligence role to target the president’s political enemies after using confidential records under his housing finance agency’s purview to accuse Democrats of committing mortgage fraud.
Sen. Mark R. Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the intelligence committee, said Mr. Trump “seems determined to turn America’s national security into a political bargaining chip” by pulling back on Mr. Clayton’s nomination and making “a voter disenfranchisement law that does not have the votes” a prerequisite to renewing FISA.
“This is a careless White House, a president that is treating our national security with complete disdain, acting at a level that puts Americans at risk,” he said.
Mr. Warner added that Mr. Trump may be trying to distract from a peace agreement with Iran that falls short of his stated objectives for going to war.
Mr. Trump said he wanted to slow Mr. Clayton’s confirmation because he felt Republicans were getting rolled by Democrats seeking to block Mr. Pulte.
“They were doing a rush act, and we didn’t get anything for it,” he said.
Senate Republicans briefly pushed back after Mr. Trump tried to unilaterally cancel Mr. Clayton’s confirmation hearing.
Intelligence committee Chairman Tom Cotton, Arkansas Republican, said he would proceed unless the president withdrew the nomination or directed Mr. Clayton not to appear.
Mr. Trump opted for the latter, which the chairman called “regrettable.”
“Mr. Clayton is a patriot and a highly qualified nominee, as the president has said repeatedly,” Mr. Cotton said. “While today’s hearing is now unfortunately postponed, I look forward to proceeding with his confirmation in the near future.”
Mr. Trump’s move ensures that Mr. Pulte will take over as acting director on Friday as planned.
The president tasked Mr. Pulte with downsizing the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees 18 disparate intelligence agencies.
He said Mr. Pulte will remain acting director “as long as it takes to get everybody else approved.”
The president said he does not want to remove Mr. Clayton as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York until his nominee to replace him, Jamie McDonald, is confirmed.
However, the Senate cannot confirm someone to a role for which there is no vacancy.
“To add a slight bit of intrigue,” Mr. Trump said, he would also add the SAVE America Act among his demands for replacing Mr. Pulte and renewing FISA.
The House-passed SAVE America Act requires proof of citizenship to register to vote and a photo ID to cast a ballot.
Mr. Trump is pushing for an expanded version that would also ban states from automatically sending out mail-in ballots to all registered voters and block biological men from playing in women’s sports and “transgender mutilation” procedures on children.
That version lacks enough Republican support to pass either chamber, let alone clear a Democratic filibuster in the Senate.
Attaching the SAVE America Act to FISA would effectively kill the bill, as Republican leaders have made clear to Mr. Trump.
“We will never pass the SAVE Act, never. It is so damaging to our democracy,” said Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat. He called Mr. Trump an “embarrassment” to Republicans who are searching for a path forward on FISA.
Instead of turning on Mr. Trump, Republicans are fighting among themselves about the SAVE America Act.
Sen. Mike Lee, Utah Republican and the bill’s lead author, said Republicans have enough support to clear the House-passed version of the bill but are unwilling to enforce a talking filibuster that would require Democrats to exhaust debate on the floor.
Such a move theoretically allows a simple-majority vote on the bill, rather than the 60 votes needed to end a filibuster and cut off debate. However, a talking filibuster would likely require other procedural and policy votes that Republicans could have trouble defeating.
Sen. John Cornyn, Texas Republican, took a veiled shot at Mr. Lee after a closed-door Republican lunch where the FISA-SAVE America Act dilemma was discussed.
“I think part of the problem is not President Trump; it’s us making unrealistic promises, and then when they’re not attained, then criticizing one another,” he said.
• Kerry Picket contributed to this report.
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