Reuters AlertNet Lite - Senate committee recommends McConnell as spy chief

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Senate committee recommends McConnell as spy chief

06 Feb 2007 21:35:29 GMT
Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - A U.S. Senate panel on Tuesday endorsed the nomination of retired Navy Adm. Mike McConnell as President George W. Bush's top intelligence adviser.

The unanimous vote by the 15-member Senate Select Committee on Intelligence sends McConnell's candidacy to be the second U.S. director of national intelligence to the full Senate for consideration.

Lawmakers are expected to approve the nomination by a wide margin in a vote that could come within days.

If confirmed, he would succeed John Negroponte to run the 16-agency espionage community as U.S. intelligence chief, a job created by post-Sept. 11 reforms. Negroponte has been nominated by Bush to serve as deputy secretary of state.

McConnell, 63, is a career military intelligence officer who ran the National Security Agency, the Pentagon's electronic surveillance and code-breaking organization, from 1992 to 1996. The agency has more recently become embroiled in controversy over Bush's domestic spying program.

He rose to prominence as an intelligence officer during the administration of Bush's father, George H.W. Bush, when he served as a 1991 Gulf War adviser to Colin Powell, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

McConnell has spent the past decade as a private sector consultant on military intelligence and information operations with the firm Booz Allen Hamilton.

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Last updated:Tue Feb 6 21:36:20 2007