The Senate on Thursday confirmed Ratcliffe, giving President Donald Trump the second member of his new Cabinet.
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00:00Good afternoon everybody. It's great to have you here. I'm thrilled to be joined, of course,
00:05by our incoming director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John Ratcliffe, as well as his lovely
00:11wife, Michelle. And I will say that John is a great patriot, a guy that has the trust
00:17of the President, and I think really believes deeply in the mission, first of all, of keeping
00:21Americans safe, but also doing it in a way that ensures that the American people have
00:26confidence in our national intelligence services. And both of those things really matter. We're
00:30not going to have much safety, and we're not going to have great intelligence services
00:35unless the American people actually trust that those intelligence services are doing
00:39their job. And I have every confidence that John Ratcliffe is going to do that. That's
00:42why the President nominated him, and that's why the Senate confirmed him with big margins.
00:47Now normally, after I administer the oath, I would actually invite the new guy to say
00:55a few words, but given that he's the leader of the CIA, anything that he told you he would
01:00have to, well, you know how that goes. So John Ratcliffe is not going to give any remarks
01:04because every piece of knowledge in his brain is actually classified, so he's going to head
01:08straight to Langley and do his job that the American people need him to do. So John, are
01:12you ready? I'm ready. Okay, please place your hand on the Bible, raise your right hand.
01:17I, John Ratcliffe, I, John Ratcliffe, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will support,
01:21defend the Constitution of the United States, that I will support and defend the Constitution
01:25of the United States, against all enemies foreign and domestic, against all enemies
01:30foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, that I will
01:34bear true faith and allegiance to the same, that I take this obligation freely, that I
01:38take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, without
01:44any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge,
01:50and that I will well and faithfully discharge, the duties of the office on which I am about
01:54to enter, the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God. So help
01:59me God. Congratulations. Thank you.