WASHINGTON - Ms Avril Haines, tapped by President-elect Joe Biden to be the top US spy, is a former CIA No. 2 who would be taking over as the chief overseer of a US intelligence community beset by low morale and charges its work has been used for political attacks.
"Avril is smart and capable," said Mr Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee."I expect that she will face rigorous questioning from senators on both sides of the aisle." She returned to the White House as former President Barack Obama's deputy national security adviser. There, she steered a decision to expand US refugee admissions as the Syrian civil war unleashed a refugee flood, arguing that doing so contradicted Islamist extremists' anti-Western messages.