President Donald Trump said Thursday he will not be nominating Bill Pulte for the permanent job of director of national intelligence (DNI), just days after blindsiding the housing and intelligence communities by selecting Pulte for the role on an acting basis.

Instead, Trump said the chairman of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s boards of directors may spend his time as the top White House intelligence official pursuing the president’s unproven claims that past elections have been “rigged” against him.

State and federal judges have dismissed more than 50 lawsuits presented by the president or his allies claiming the 2020 presidential election was plagued by voter fraud.

“He’s a very smart guy and he may find out some things about the rigged elections, etcetera, etcetera,” said Trump, speaking to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on Thursday afternoon. “I think he’d like to do it. I think he wants to do it very much, got a lot of energy.”

The selection of the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) to serve as acting DNI immediately produced sharp opposition after Trump announced the selection in a social media post on Tuesday, with a chorus of Republican senators deriding Pulte as professionally and statutorily unqualified.

“It’s an acting position. It’s not a permanent position,” Trump clarified on Thursday. Pulte is also expected to remain in his role at the FHFA, which regulates government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as well as the chairman roles, to which Pulte appointed himself last year.

“He’s not going to be permanent because I don’t think he’d want to be permanent,” the president continued, characterizing Pulte as “somebody just to take it over for a little while” while confirming that the White House is actively interviewing permanent candidates.

But across town Thursday evening a trio of GOP lawmakers formalized their opposition to the Pulte choice by voting in support of a measure that would have barred any Senate-confirmed head of a federal agency or department from simultaneously serving as acting DNI.

Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine broke party ranks to vote in support of the budget-bill amendment, introduced by Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., who vice chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee. The amendment ultimately failed by a 49-49 tally.

A staunch Trump loyalist, Pulte’s run at the FHFA has been marked by repeated controversies. Outgoing Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., who sits on the Senate Housing Committee, described the head of the FHFA as an “incendiary attack dog” earlier this week on CNBC.

Pulte is currently being investigated by a congressional watchdog agency for using his regulatory authority to investigate perceived Trump administration foes for mortgage fraud, including New York Attorney General Leticia James and Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook.

The latter referral prompted Trump’s unprecedented attempt to fire Cook for cause, despite the allegations against her being unproven. The Supreme Court is currently deliberating whether the president sought to remove Cook unlawfully and is expected to rule on that case in coming weeks.

Meanwhile, Bloomberg reported in January that Pulte was a “driving force” behind a criminal investigation of former Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and the central bank, which Powell publicly framed as a political assault against Fed independence.

The administration’s actions against Powell in the final months of his chairmanship ultimately led Powell to retain his seat on the Board of Governors after his term expired in May.

Asked Thursday why he considers Pulte as having the “necessary national security experience” to perform the acting DNI role, Trump replied, “because he’s smart,” and he believes Pulte “is a guy who will be able to figure it out very quickly.”

Nominees for director of national intelligence — who if confirmed are tasked with aligning security and budgetary priorities across the world’s most sophisticated intelligence apparatus — are required by law to have “extensive national security expertise,” precluding any aptitude for learning quickly on the job.

“We don’t need a weaponized DNI,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., speaking to reporters on Tuesday after the Pulte announcement, asked to comment on the director’s role in launching the highly publicized mortgage fraud investigations. “We need professionals there.”

A request for comment placed with Thune’s office was not returned by time of publication.