The Trump administration and its allies in Congress are presenting a shifting new justification for the U.S. attack on Iran.

Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Warner has announced he’ll seek reelection in what will be a critical race for a narrowly divided Senate.

A briefing held only for Republicans in Congress on U.S. military strikes is drawing a fierce rebuke from a key Democrat.

The top ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee says a classified meeting planned with a key U.S. spy agency was called off after it was criticized by Laura Loomer, a far-right conspiracy theorist.

FBI Director Kash Patel was quietly removed weeks ago as the acting chief of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and has been replaced with the Army secretary.

The Trump administration's use of a popular app to discuss sensitive military plans — with a journalist on the text chain — is raising questions about security and the importance of safeguarding the nation's secrets.

The Trump administration’s top intelligence officials have stressed to Congress the threat they say is posed by international criminal gangs, drug cartels and human smuggling.

Tulsi Gabbard, President Donald Trump's pick to be director of national intelligence, has moved a step closer to Senate confirmation.

President Donald Trump’s most controversial Cabinet nominees have flooded the zone Thursday in back-to-back-to-back confirmation hearings.

John Ratcliffe, President-elect Donald Trump's pick to lead the CIA, has told members of the Senate that the nation's premier spy agency can do better.

Eight individuals from Tajikistan with suspected ties to the Islamic State group have been arrested in the United States in recent days.

Former Florida Sen. Bob Graham, who chaired the Intelligence Committee following the 2001 terrorist attacks and opposed the Iraq invasion, has died.

A person familiar with the matter says the Federal Trade Commission is investigating TikTok over its data and security practices.

U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico will seek a third term next year as he champions causes from gun safety to abortion access to a transition toward cleaner sources of energy.

Members of the Senate intelligence committee say they should have access to classified documents that were discovered in the homes of President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence.

A watchdog investigation initiated after the tax returns of two former FBI directors had been subjected to intensive audits during the Trump administration has concluded that the reviews from those years were conducted at random.

The top official of SolarWinds says the hackers who carried out the intrusion of his software company were in its network as early as January 2019.

The U.S. government is working to draw attention to supply chain vulnerabilities.

The announcement makes Haaland's confirmation by the Senate nearly certain and follows Haaland's endorsement last week by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Manchin, a moderate from West Virginia, had been publicly undecided through two days of hearings on Haaland’s nomination by President Joe Biden. Collins said she also appreciated Haaland’s support on issues important to Maine, such as Acadia National Park, “as well as her deep knowledge of tribal issues, which has earned her the support of tribes across the country, including those in Maine.'' Interior oversees the nation's public lands and waters and leads relations with nearly 600 federally recognized tribes. AdThe Senate energy panel is set to vote on Haaland's nomination Thursday.

William Burns testifies before a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on his nomination to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Wednesday, Feb. 24, 2021 on Capitol Hill in Washington. (Tom Williams/Pool via AP)WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden's nominee to run the CIA told lawmakers Wednesday that he would keep politics out of the job and deliver “unvarnished” intelligence to politicians and policymakers even if they don't want to hear it. William Burns told members of the Senate Intelligence Committee at his confirmation hearing that “politics must stop where intelligence work begins.”“That is exactly what President Biden expects of CIA. It was the first thing he told me when he asked me to take on this role," Burns said. AdWhile Russia is in many ways a declining world power, the country remains a disruptive and potent threat, Burns said.

FireEye CEO Kevin Mandia, SolarWinds CEO Sudhakar Ramakrishna and Microsoft President Brad Smith testify during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2021 in Washington. In the first congressional hearing on the breach, representatives of technology companies involved in the response described a hack of almost breathtaking precision, ambition and scope. “We haven’t seen this kind of sophistication matched with this kind of scale,” Microsoft President Brad Smith told the Senate Intelligence Committee. U.S. national security officials have also said Russia was likely responsible for the breach, and President Joe Biden's administration is weighing punitive measures against Russia for the hack as well as other activities. Officials have said the motive for the hack, which was discovered by private security company FireEye in December, appeared to be to gather intelligence.

FILE - In this Nov. 24, 2020, file photo President-elect Joe Biden's nominee for Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines speaks at The Queen theater in Wilmington, Del. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)WASHINGTON – A confirmation hearing for President-elect Joe Biden's pick for national intelligence director has been postponed until next week, according to leaders of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Avril Haines, a former CIA deputy director and former deputy national security adviser in the Obama administration, was to have appeared Friday before the Senate Intelligence Committee. The hearing was announced Wednesday, setting Haines up to be the first of Biden's picks to face a Senate committee for confirmation. “We are disappointed the hearing was delayed, particularly given the urgency to have national security leaders in place in this time of crisis.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., holds a news conference on the day after violent protesters loyal to President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Congress, at the Capitol in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 7, 2021. “It has been an epiphany for the world to see that there are people in our country led by this president, for the moment, who have chosen their whiteness over democracy,” Pelosi said. Pelosi says, “The complicity, not only the complicity, the instigation of the president of United States, must and will be addressed.”___1:25 p.m. Flight attendants have expressed concern that their flights could be carrying supporters of President Donald Trump who took part in Wednesday’s violent protest and siege of the U.S. Capitol. ___2:25 a.m.Democrats in Congress are laying the groundwork to impeach President Donald Trump.

The former astronaut defeated Republican Sen. Martha McSally, who was appointed to the seat after McCain’s death in 2018. Daines’ first election in 2014 broke a Democratic lock on the Senate seat that had lasted more than 100 years. The six-term congressman from northern New Mexico defeated Republican Mark Ronchetti, a former television meteorologist, and Libertarian Bob Walsh. Reed cruised to victory over Waters, an investment consultant who mounted earlier unsuccessful campaigns for state Senate and U.S. Senate in Massachusetts. Warner defeated Republican challenger Daniel Gade in a low-key race in which the incumbent had a massive cash advantage.

(AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File)WASHINGTON – U.S. officials said Thursday that Russian hackers have targeted the networks of dozens of state and local governments in the United States in recent days, stealing data from at least two servers. “However, the actor may be seeking access to obtain future disruption options, to influence U.S. policies and actions, or to delegitimize (state and local) government entities,” the advisory said. He said the alert was issued in regard to the scanning of county networks for vulnerabilities, not specifically to the targeting of elections. As of October 1, the advisory said, the hackers have exfiltrated data from at least two servers. Hultquist said he does not think Energetic Bear has the ability to directly affect the U.S. vote but fears it could disrupt local and state government networks proximate to the systems that process votes.

Officials say Russia and Iran have obtained some voter registration data, aiming to interfere in the November election. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik, Pool, File)BOSTON – U.S. officials accused Iran on Wednesday of being behind a flurry of emails sent to Democratic voters in multiple battleground states that appeared to be aimed at intimidating them into voting for President Donald Trump. Iran sent spoofed emails designed to intimidate voters and sow unrest and also distributed a video that falsely suggested voters could cast fraudulent ballots from overseas, Ratcliffe said. Though Democratic voters were targeted, Ratcliffe said the spoofed emails were intended to harm Trump, though he did not elaborate how. “These emails are meant to intimidate and undermine American voters’ confidence in our elections,” Christopher Krebs, the top election security official at the Department of Homeland Security, tweeted Tuesday night after reports of the emails first surfaced.

A House subcommittee examining President Donald Trumps response to the coronavirus pandemic is launching an investigation into reports that political appointees have meddled with routine government scientific data to better align with Trumps public statements. Scott Applewhite, File)WASHINGTON – A House subcommittee examining President Donald Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic is launching an investigation into reports that political appointees have meddled with routine government scientific data to better align with Trump’s public statements. Known as MMWR, the report has long been a sacred government information resource for doctors, scientists and researchers tracking outbreaks. The officials pressured CDC to change the reports, at times retroactively, to better align them with Trump’s often rosier public statements about the coronavirus, Politico reported. Caputo is a longtime friend and fierce defender of Trump who worked on his presidential campaign.

WASHINGTON Sen. Marco Rubio, the new Republican chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is warning that foreign actors will seek to amplify conspiracy theories about the coronavirus and find new ways to interfere in the 2020 presidential election. Rubio is taking over the chairmanship just as the committee wraps up a three-year investigation into the Russian interference. The panel has publicly released its endorsement of a 2017 assessment by intelligence agencies that Russia interfered and favored Trump, a conclusion that Trump has disputed. I think our report will be one of now several inquiries or investigative efforts that have led to the same conclusion, Rubio said. Rubio has shown little interest in criticizing Trumps response to the coronavirus, including his refusal to wear a mask in public.

WASHINGTON Florida Sen. Marco Rubio will temporarily become chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Republican leaders announced, taking charge of the panel at a time of turnover and tension in the nation's intelligence community. Rubio has focused much of his Senate career on foreign policy, particularly Russia and China, and he is a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations panel. He is also the chairman of the Senate small-business committee, where he has been negotiating relief measures during the coronavirus pandemic. In announcing Rubio's appointment to head the intelligence panel, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell did not say whether he would keep the small-business gavel. "I am grateful to Leader McConnell for his confidence in me to lead the Senate Intelligence Committee during Senator Burrs absence from the chairmanship, he said.

WASHINGTON Florida Sen. Marco Rubio will temporarily become chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Republican leaders announced Monday, taking charge of the panel at a time of turnover and tension in the nation's intelligence community. Trump has also repeatedly questioned the intelligence agencies' conclusions that Russia attempted to interfere in the 2016 elections. The Senate panel endorsed that conclusion in a report last month including that Russia had a preference for Trump and Rubio has repeatedly warned that Russia could try again. In announcing Rubio's appointment to head the intelligence panel, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell did not say whether he would keep the small-business gavel. "I am grateful to Leader McConnell for his confidence in me to lead the Senate Intelligence Committee during Senator Burrs absence from the chairmanship, he said.

WASHINGTON Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr on Friday submitted the final report in the panel's three-year Russia investigation to the intelligence community for a declassification review. The report on the panels counterintelligence findings including whether President Donald Trumps campaign coordinated with Russia marks the conclusion of its Russia probe, which it first launched in January 2017. It had been the final known investigation of Trumps 2016 campaign and Russia that was still active. Committee members have remained quiet on the panels conclusion on whether Trumps campaign coordinated with Russia. But Burr has said several times that he has seen no evidence of such collusion, a conclusion that would be in line with the House Intelligence Committees own Russia report in 2018.

But to Senate Republicans, particularly ones who need Trump's support to win difficult reelections, that admission is simply not enough. "The Senate Intelligence Committee is having an investigation, a bipartisan investigation." "Every senator voted for the Senate Intelligence Committee to look into the matter in a bipartisan way," Arizona GOP Sen. Martha McSally told 12 News KPNX this week. Now, many Republicans are relying on a Senate committee that its leaders have acknowledged will take a slow, methodical approach in its investigation. While the House investigation devolved into partisan warfare, the Senate conducted a bipartisan probe.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - The Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday released a wide-ranging report that detailed Russia's attempts to hack US election infrastructure during the 2016 election, urging states and the federal government to do more to prevent election cyberattacks in the future. Thursday's release comes as Senate Democrats continue to slam their Republican colleagues and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for preventing a vote on several pieces of election security legislation. Senate Democrats are likely to point to the report as reason for the Senate to pass election security legislation. "It is my hope that the Senate Intelligence Committee's bipartisan report will provide the American people with valuable insight into the election security threats still facing our nation and the ways we can address them." First of five reportsThe report on election security is the first of five that the Senate Intelligence Committee plans to publish as part of its two-year investigation into Russian election interference.