# National Counterterrorism Center The intelligence community's counterterrorism fusion body, established by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 on the 9/11 Commission's recommendation and housed within [[ODNI]]. Its purpose is to integrate terrorism intelligence across the agencies that had failed to share it before the [[September 11 Attacks]] — the "connect the dots" function ODNI itself was built around. **Why this page exists in this vault:** NCTC is the piece of ODNI whose survival or destruction is the clearest test of whether the 2026 downsizing was efficiency or dismantlement. Reporting during [[Bill Pulte]]'s acting tenure was contradictory on this point — some accounts placed the firings inside NCTC, while later reporting indicated Pulte considered sweeping NCTC cuts, backed off, and hit ODNI's intelligence-analysis and mission-integration layer instead. Separately, [[Tom Cotton]]'s Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act would transfer NCTC out of ODNI to the [[FBI]] entirely. ## Stub — to build out - Statutory mandate and the IRTPA structure - Relationship to CIA's Counterterrorism Center and to FBI's counterterrorism division - The terrorist-watchlist and TIDE database function - The 2026 cuts question, resolved against the best available reporting - The Cotton bill's proposed transfer to the FBI ## Related - [[ODNI]] - [[Intelligence Community Hub]] - [[DNI Succession News Log]]