 During his subsequent service on several Senate staffs, he worked as national security advisor to Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine), chief investigative counsel for the Governmental Affairs Committee, and staff director and chief counsel of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.He joined the staff of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) just after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, serving there under Vice Chairman Richard Shelby (R-Alabama) and then-Chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kansas), first as Minority Counsel and then as General Counsel.Ford joined the U.S. State Department in 2003, as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in what was then the department’s Bureau of Verification and Compliance under Assistant Secretary of State Paula A. DeSutter, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs John Bolton, and Secretary of State Colin Powell.