WASHINGTON — Dennis Blair will resign today as the nation’s intelligence director after a tenure marred by the recent failures of U.S. spy agencies to detect terrorist plots and by political missteps that undermined his standing with the White House.
Blair, a retired U.S. Navy admiral, was pushed out 16 months after he became President Barack Obama’s surprise pick to be the nation’s third director of national intelligence. His departure is likely to renew debate over whether the DNI position, a daunting job created amid sweeping intelligence reforms after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, is fundamentally flawed.
Blair’s offer to step down came during a phone conversation with Obama on Thursday in which the president said he planned to put someone new in the director position, according to an official familiar with the exchange.
Blair becomes the highest-ranking member of the administration to resign.
Current and former U.S. officials identified three candidates who have been spoken to about the job: former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., who serves as co- chairman of Obama’s intelligence advisory board; James Clapper, a retired Air Force lieutenant general serving as undersecretary of defense for intelligence; and John Hamre, a former deputy secretary of defense who leads the Defense Policy Board.
