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Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, is expected to step down in the coming days after spending his tenure at odds with President Trump over issues including Russia and Mr. Trump’s own attacks on the intelligence community, people familiar with the decision said on Sunday.

To replace him, the people said, the president was likely to tap Representative John Ratcliffe, a Texas Republican and staunch defender of Mr. Trump. As a member of the House Judiciary Committee, he sharply questioned Robert S. Mueller III, the former special counsel, at last week’s hearing. Still, it was not certain who the replacement would be, as Mr. Trump increasingly has a cabinet filled with “acting” appointees.

Mr. Coats has long been expected to depart of his own accord, an administration official said, but he ended up staying on longer so it would not seem as if he was forced out during a time of controversy with Mr. Trump. His precise departure date remained unclear on Sunday.

Mr. Trump’s frustration with Mr. Coats was reignited in recent months, during spring weekends spent at his private club in Palm Beach, Fla., according to people who spoke with him at the time.
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Mr. Trump has weighed firing Mr. Coats since he took issue with the president’s assertions, after a 2018 meeting in Finland with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, challenging the intelligence community’s conclusions that Moscow interfered in the 2016 presidential race. Mr. Coats also questioned the wisdom of a potential White House meeting between the two leaders.

Some of the president’s political advisers have encouraged him to oust Mr. Coats, but he had been shielded by Vice President Mike Pence, a longtime protégé. Mr. Coats served as a senator from Indiana, and Mr. Pence was the state’s governor.

His pending departure has been whispered about in Washington for weeks, and Axios first reported on Sunday that Mr. Ratcliffe was now the favorite. As with all personnel moves in Mr. Trump’s administration, the president could change his mind before anything is made official.