U.S. Senate confirms nomination of next FBI director

The U.S. Senate on Monday voted with bipartisan majority to confirm former Deputy Attorney General James Comey to replace Robert Mueller as the next FBI director.

In a 93 to 1 vote, the Senate confirmed Comey to head the FBI. Comey, who worked in the Justice Department under former President George W. Bush, will succeed outgoing FBI Director Robert Mueller and serve a 10-year term.

U.S. President Barack Obama applauded the Senate's approval of the next FBI head shortly after the Senate's vote.

"Jim is a natural leader of unquestioned integrity. In the face of ever-changing threats, he has repeatedly demonstrated his commitment to defending America's security and ideals alike. With Jim at the Bureau's helm, I know that the FBI will be in good hands long after I've left office," said the president in a White House statement.

Comey, 52, the No. 2 official in Bush's Justice Department, had been seen as a top choice for the next FBI director.

He earned praise when he resisted renewing approval for an eavesdropping program in 2004 at the request of former Bush administration officials and threatened to resign along with other law enforcement officials, including Mueller.

Obama announced his nomination for Comey in late June, amid controversies over the U.S. intelligence community's classified surveillance programs.

When announcing the nomination, the president said in particular that Comey was once prepared to give up his job rather than "be part of something he felt was fundamentally wrong."

Mueller has been chief of the FBI for almost 12 years, starting just days before the Sept. 11 terror attacks in 2001.

His 10-year-term has been extended by two more years by Congress at Obama's request and is scheduled to expire in September.

Mueller is leaving at a time when the FBI is facing a number of questions, including whether more could have been done to prevent the Boston bombings.

On April 15, twin bombings killed three people and wounded more than 200 in Boston, in the first successful terrorist attack against civilian targets in U.S. homeland after the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001.

It was later revealed that the Russian authorities had warned the FBI about one of the suspects' extremist tendencies, but the FBI cleared him after interviewing him.

Testifying before a Senate panel in June, Mueller said the country is facing "a continuing threat from homegrown violent extremists" while foreign terrorists still seek to strike Americans at home and abroad.