Told very specifically that the whistleblower did not want to get any of this information out, they didnt want it to leak out. So there were only a few potential groups of people that would have known about this complaint, you and your people within your office. Yes, sir. The people within the Inspector Generals Office and the whistleblower and whoever that whistleblower gave this information to. So what im trying to ascertain is how would it run in the all the Mainstream Media outlets . Even though they got a lot of it wrong but they had the basics of it that it involved the president of the United States talking to a foreign leader. Did you or anybody in your office leak this to the Washington Post or nbc news . Ranking member, i lead the Intelligence Community. We know how to keep a secret. As far as how that got into the press, i really do not know, sir. I just know that its all over the place and as you said its been reported by different media over the past several weeks. Where they get their information from i dont know. It was not from the Intelligence Community, from me or from my office. Thank you, director. So this is not the first time this happened to this president. It happened with a call between the mexican president , the australian Prime Minister. So its happened twice before that pieces of transcripts leaked out. And of course this time it was leaked out again and the president thankfully was able to put this out because of the actions of the situation, as you said thats unprecedented. Is it normal for the president of the United States to have their conversations leak out . This is the third time. I would have to leave that to the white house to respond to that there, Ranking Member. But to me, the president of the United States conversation with any other head of state i would consider privileged conversation. Clearly those conversations are being captured by the intelligence agencies. Not necessarily, sir. I mean, if president i should say this, theyre captured disseminated to the intelligence communities. I have to be careful how i respond to that. Were not supposed to have the either president of the United States not talk to foreign leaders or lets publish all the transcripts because thats whats happening here. Ranking member somebodys leaking this and its likely coming from the agencies that you oversee. Ranking member, no. Sir im not saying that you dont know, but we had the transcript with the mexican president , the australia Prime Minister and now contents of a call with the ukraine leak out. The allegation in the whistleblower complaint was there were about 12 people who listened in on the conversation, members of the National Security council and otothers. Others were briefed from the state department as well of the transcripts because they have an area responsibility and a regio be informed on the interaction. So there were a number of people that from the white house briefed on the call. Im quite sure this. The white house probably didnt leak this out. I wouldnt say the white house, but there are individuals within the white house that may or may not. I dont know. But it would not be from an intelligence intercept, i will say that. Right. Im just saying the dissemination of these calls is supposed to be sacred, right . It is important for the state department and the appropriate agencies to get im not saying its all the intelligence agency, but when a president talks to a foreign leader, its confidential. Those contents are confidential. There could be some facts of that conversation that you do want to get to the appropriate agency, not just the i. C. I want to be clear about this. This is now the third time. Im not aware of this ever happening before, of contents of calls like this getting out. I dont know, Ranking Member. Im not aware. I dont have the numbers. It just seems to me, though, it is unprecedented. I would also say that i think the decision by the president yesterday to release the transcripts of his conversation with the president of the ukraine is probably unprecedented as well. We appreciate you being here and have fun. Be careful what you say because theyre going to use these word against you. I tell you what, Ranking Member. Either way, im honored to be here. I appreciate your service to this country for a long t i sur well behopey not in the public, hopefully behind closed done. Like this is supposed thank you very much. I yield maguire, thank you for being here and thank you for your profound service and the service of your family to this country. Director, what i find bewildering about this whole conversation is that we are not sitting here today and the American Public is not aware of the allegations of the president asking for a favor of investigation into his political opponent, were not aware of the murky decision to withhold aid, were not aware of mr. Giulianis apparent establishment of a personal state department. Were not aware of a possible retaliation against a u. S. Ambassador. None of this happens but for the decision of your Inspector General, Michael Atkinson, a man who was appointed by President Trump and confirmed by a Republican Senate to come to this committee seven days after the complaint was required by law to be tra it was his decision, personal decision, not the kaleidoscope of fantastic conspiracy theories the Ranking Member thinks is happening here, but it was the decision of Michael Atkinson, an appointee of this president , to come to this committee, following not advice from you or any law but following his own conscience. Without his decision to do this, none of this is happening, correct . I applaud michael. I applaud michaels the way he has done this. He has acted in good faith. He has followed the law every step of the way. The question is, did it or did it not meet the Legal Definition no, sir. I asked a very different question. Its a simple question. Without his decision, none of this is happening, is that correct . Weve got to back up to the whistleblower as well. I should have noted that the whistleblower also deserves the same accolades that mr. Atkinson you ever advised by the white house not to provide this complaint to congress for any reason . No, congressman. Okay. As i understand it, the opinion was that you were not obligated to convey the complaint to congress. So the decision was taken to defy a subpoena of this congress, the subpoena of september 17th to turn over the complaint. Who made the decision to defy that subpoena of september 17th . Congressman, urgent concern sir, im asking a very simple question. Who made the decision to defy the congressional subpoena . Somebody said, we will not abide by this subpoena and id like to know who that somebody was. Congressman, nobody did. I endeavored once we no longer had urgent concern with the 7daytime line to work to get the information to the committee, what i needed to do was to get work through the executive privilege hurdles with the office of Legal Counsel at the white house. Although this was the most important issue to me, you know, the white house has got quite a few other issues that they dealt with. I would have liked to have had, as i said to the chairman, that perhaps this moved a little faster than it did, but this is a very deliberate process and finally it came to a head yesterday. When i received the information on the 26th of august we had seven days based on the whistleblower protection act. All we did was lose those seven days. It may have taken longer than we would have liked or you would have liked but you have the information. So im focused on the subpoena. Yes, sir. The subpoena is on the desk, the subpoena of the congress of the United States. Its pretty clear what it asked for. Youre saying a decision was never made not to comply with that subpoena, yet somehow it was never complied with. Im looking for the Decision Making process to ignore a legal congressional subpoena. Congressman, i did not ignore. I dealt with the chairman of this committee and asked to have one more week to be able to do what i needed to do to get this information released. He was gracious enough and this committee was also very supportive. I was committed to this committee and the chairman to get that information and i was finally able to provide that yesterday. Thank you, director. Did you or your office ever speak to the president of the United States about this complaint . Congressman, tim the president s intelligence officer. I speak with him several times throughout the week. Listen to my question. Did you ever speak to the president about this complaint . My conversations with the president , because im the director of National Intelligence, are privileged. It would be inappropriate for me because it would destroy my relationship with the president in Intelligence Matters to divulge any of my conversations with the president of the United States. Just so we can be clear for the record, you are not denying that you spoke to the president about this complaint . What im saying, congressman, is that i will not divulge privileged conversations that i have as the director of National Intelligence with the president. Has the white house instructed you to assert that privilege . No, sir. Its just a member of the executive branch as a member of the National Security council and also the homeland committee. I just have to maintain the discretion and protect the conversation with the president of the United States. I appreciate that answer. Apparently the clock is broken but i will yield back the balance of my time. Thank you, congressman. Mr. Conaway. Thank you for being here. You and i are at a competitive disadvantage because neither of us are lawyers. That may be a badge of honor for some of us. You have lawyers on your staff, sir . I do, congressman. Your lawyers have looked at this urgent concern definition thoroughly and have given you advice . Yes, congressman. If the black letter law was so clear in black letter, how is it weve got different attorneys giving you and i different opinions. Thats a rhetorical question. Just to clarify, Mike Atkinson was in our group in front of us last week, did a very good job of telling us what he did, what he didnt do. We now know for sure what it is he was able to do. As part of his investigation, he did not request records of the call from the president. The reason is he cited the difficulty of working through all of that would have probably meant he couldnt comply with the 14daytime fram time frame. He also said in his letter, i also determined this is quoting michael. I also determined that there were reasonable grounds to believe that information relating to the urgent concern appeared credible. Now thats a different statement than a flatout its credible. Again, a rhetorical statement. Is there anything of statute that your lawyers have been advising you that says the determ ccern lies solely with the icig . No, sir. I was never advised that. Has the Justice Department ever weighed in to say the fact that dni cant make a separate decision of that sevenday process, that the matter is not of urgent concern as your team decided . The matter of urgent concern is a legally defining term. Its pretty much either yes or no. Thats not the case because the i. G. Said it was and youre saying its not under that Legal Definition because it involved the president. Last time i checked youre pretty familiar with chain of command, i know. Hes not in your chain of command. Youre in his chain of command. So it doesnt meet the statutorily urgent concern definition with respect to the whistleblower protections of the i. G. And your team made that call. The Inspector General made a different call. No, sir. John ratcliffe. It was the department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel that made the determination that it was not urgent concern. All we wanted to do was just check and see. And to me, it just seemed prudent with the matter at hand right now to be able to just make sure that in fact it did. And when it didnt, i want to say once again i endeavored to get that information to this committee. Just to clarify the role that the Inspector General had with respect to the department of justice, i heard you say he was involved in the conversations, allowed to make his case, but also said you gave the Justice Department the letter. What was his exact involvement in making his case to the Justice Department . Was he there present physically or his lawyers there . To the best of my knowledge, the icigs transmittal letter as well as the complaint from the whistleblower were forwarded to the office of Legal Counsel for their determination. I believe that that is what they based their opinion on. Okay. If im incorrect, i will come back to the committee and correct that sir. Okay. Appreciate that. Youre in a tough spot. I appreciate your long storied history. I apologize if your integrity was insulted. That happens in this arena a lot, sometimes justified and most of the time not and your insult to your integrity was not justified. The fact that we have differences of opinion, when we start losing those differences of opinion we start to attack each other, call each other names and those kin things. My experience is when youve got a legal matter, ive got lawyers i pay, youve got lawyers you pay. I typically stick with the lawyers that im paying. So youve got good legal advice on this issue in a really tough spot wanting to make sure this whistleblower was protected but at the same time if there was something awry here it would get the full airing that its been getting. Thank you for your service. Mi wanto turn to what i fear may be one of the most longterm damaging effects of this whistleblower episode and that is the Chilling Effect it will have on others in government who may witness misconduct but now may be afraid to come forward to report it. Sir, im worried that Government Employees and contractors may see how important this situation has played out and decide its not worth putting themselves on the line. The fact that a whistleblower followed all the proper procedures to report misconduct and then the department of justice and the white house seems to have weighed in to keep the complaint hidden is problematic, sir. I want to know whether or not you see how problematic this will be in having a Chilling Effect on members of the ic that you are sworn to represent and ostensibly protect. Congresswoman, i think thats a fair assessment. I dont disagree with what youve said. I have endeavored to transmit to the Intelligence Community my support of the whistleblower. Im quite sure for at least two hours this morning there are not many people in the Intelligence Community doing anything productive besides watching this. My concern is a valid one that what has hammoppened with s whistleblower episode will have a Chilling Effect. I just want to ask you have you given direction to this whistleblower that he or she can in fact come before congress . When the president called the whistleblower a political hack andge sstedug to the country, you remained silent. Im not sure why, but i also think that adds to the Chilling Effect. The statute seems pretty clear that you shall everybody has a role to play. The process is pretty clear. And part of it also includes you directing the whistleblower of his or her protected rights. Can you confirm that youve directed that whistleblower that he or she can come before congress . Well, congresswoman, there are several questions there. One, i do not know the identity of the whistleblower. Two, now that the complaint has come forward, we are working with his counsel in order to be able to provide them with security clearance. Sir, i think my question is pretty simple. Can you assure this committee and the American Public that the whistleblower is authorized to speak to the committee with the full protections of the whistleblower act . Can you confirm that . Thats a yes or no question. Right now im working through that with the chair. To the best of my ability, i believe the chair was asking to have the whistleblower come forward. Im working with counsel, with the committee to support that process. Can you assure the American Public that the end result will be that the whistleblower will be able to come before this committee and congress and have the full protections of the whistleblower act . After all, what is the whistleblower statute for the not to provide those full protections against retaliation, against litigation . Congresswoman, i am doing everything to endeavor to support that. Will the gentlewoman yield . Yes. Once you work out the security claerearances for the whistleblowers counsel, that whistleblower will be able to relate the full facts within his knowledge that concern wrongdoing by the president or anyone else that he or she will not be inhibited in what