Sen. Tom Cotton is on course to lead the powerful Senate Intelligence Committee when the new Congress convenes in January, The Post has learned.
Cotton (R-Ark.), an Army infantry officer who served in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, is expected to replace outgoing vice chairman Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) — the pick of President-elect Donald Trump to be the next secretary of state — as the top GOP senator on the 17-member panel.
The elevation of Cotton, who previously ruled himself out of a position in Trump’s second administration, was first reported by Punchbowl News .
Though Sens. Jim Risch (R-Idaho) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) outrank Cotton in seniority on the Intelligence Committee, they are expected to let Cotton leapfrog them to assume the chairmanship, senior Senate GOP sources confirmed.
Risch and Collins, for their part, will chair the Senate Foreign Affairs and Appropriations committees, respectively, the sources added.
The Intelligence Committee regularly receives classified briefings from executive branch agencies — and Cotton will be a key figure in what Trump has called his fight against “deep state” bureaucrats who hampered his agenda in his first administration.
A well-respected member of the intelligence panel, Cotton led calls for a ban on all flights between the US and China in January 2020 in an effort to halt the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic out of Wuhan — and later was the first major political figure to raise the theory, now widely accepted, that the virus leaked from a lab in the central Chinese city.
Republicans will retake the coveted Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Appropriations chairs with their new Senate majority, which will stand at 53-47 when the 119th Congress convenes and lawmakers are sworn in Jan. 3.
However, with the loss of Rubio and Vice President-elect JD Vance (R-Ohio), Buckeye State Gov. Mike DeWine and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis will have to select replacements for those seats and schedule special elections for a later date.
Cotton informed the Trump transition team last week that he was not looking for a post in the administration, Axios reported, though his name had been floated for a top national security post such as FBI director, CIA director or defense secretary.
Also a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, the 47-year-old Cotton is a defense hawk and was seen as a firm defender of Trump’s agenda in the 45th president’s administration.
Last year, Cotton called for “massive” US retaliation against Iran after its terrorist proxies fired on US troops and allies in the Middle East.
However, the Arkansas Republican split from Vance’s opposition to spending $60 billion on military aid for Ukraine during a key Senate vote in April.
House Republicans are also projected to maintain their majority, but will have to fill seats vacated by Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Michael Waltz (R-Fla.), who Trump picked to be US ambassador to the United Nations and national security adviser, respectively.
A Cotton spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment.
