President Obama will accept DNI Dennis Blair's resignation per Jake Tapper (Obama asked for it)

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http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2010/05/exclusive-president-obama-to-replace-director-of-national-intelligence-dennis-blair.html


Exclusive: President Obama To Replace Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair
ABC News has learned that President Obama will replace the Director of National Intelligence, Admiral Dennis Blair (ret.) His resignation will come as soon as tomorrow, sources tell ABC News.

For several weeks President Obama has been holding serious conversations about whether to ask Blair to step down and has interviewed candidates to replace him. After a discussion this afternoon between the president and Blair in the Oval Office about the best way forward, Blair offered to resign and the president said he would accept, sources told ABC News.

Multiple administration sources tell ABC News that Blair’s tenure internally has been a rocky one.

On the heels of a number of intelligence failures involving the Fort Hood shooter, failed Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouq Abdulmuttalab, and questions about failed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad, it was no longer clear that Blair -- tasked with coordinating the 16 intelligence agencies and ensuring that they cooperate and share information – still had the full and complete confidence of the president, sources say.

The news will not come as a surprise to those in the intelligence community. For months, Blair has turf battles while the White House made it clear that it had more confidence in others, such as counterterrorism and homeland security adviser John Brennan, taking the lead both publicly and privately.
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