Intelligence Chief Nominee's Qualifications Under Scrutiny.
CAMEROTA: We do have some breaking news right now. One person is dead and at least five others hurt after a gas explosion in Lincoln County, Kentucky. Authorities say the blast happened this morning when a regional pipeline ruptured. Flames shot up 300 feet in the air, as you can see on your screen. A local meteorologist says the fire was so huge, it could be seen on radar.</s>BERMAN: First on CNN, another American citizen accused of being an ISIS fighter is being transported to the United States to face trial. U.S. officials familiar with the matter tells CNN he is a dual U.S.-Turkish national who is being held in Syria. The Justice Department has not responded to our requests for comment.</s>CAMEROTA: There are new questions this morning about the qualifications of President Trump's nominee, Congressman John Ratcliffe to be the next director of National Intelligence. CNN's Alex Marquardt is live in Washington with more. What's the latest?</s>ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Alisyn. We now have a nominee whose job it is to oversee 17 different intelligence agencies, including the CIA, who has repeatedly called for investigations into that very same intelligence community. Remember, John Ratcliffe is a three term congressman who most don't know and who has hardly any foreign policy or intelligence experience. So we here at CNN dug into what he has said behind closed doors, as well as on Fox News in his many appearances on that network, and his comments reveal someone who is a fierce defender of the presidents, extremely skeptical of the Mueller investigation, and of the intelligence community that he wants to lead. Take a listen.</s>REP. JOHN RATCLIFFE (R-TX): Think about that. A dossier funded by the Democrats, pedaled through the Obama intelligence community, falsely verified by the Obama Justice Department, then sold to the American people by those very same elected Democrats. There's been so much focus on the FBI and the Department of Justice, Martha, but a lot of the questions that relate to the origins of this go to the CIA.</s>MARQUARDT: And all these past comments are coming to light as Ratcliffe is having to defend himself against accusations that he has padded his resume. Specifically one line of his bio on his congressional website which says that as a U.S. attorney in Texas, he put terrorists in prison. Now, we've done a search of court records. We couldn't find any terrorism cases that he prosecuted. We then asked his office and they couldn't point us to any either. Instead saying that he opened, managed and supervised numerous domestic and international terrorism related cases. That is not the same thing. So all of this is causing real worry on Capitol Hill, particularly among Democrats, that this is a highly partisan nominee for a job whose very essence is not political. John.</s>BERMAN: These will make for very, very serious confirmation hearings if we get to that point. Alex Marquardt, thanks so much for being with us this morning. So we're here in Detroit wrapping up days here for these very important, very revealing, very demanding Democratic debates. So what has changed this morning in the Democratic race? We get "The Bottom Line" from our political director, next.