Tulsi Gabbard at the Fox News Channel Studios on September 13, 2023 in New York City. Credit – Steven Ferdman—Getty Images

Robert F. Kennedy. Matt Gaetz. Pete Hegseth. This week’s stream of announcements from Donald Trump revealing his plans cabinet for a second term drew stunned responses across the federal government. In the intelligence community, alarm has focused on Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick to be the next Director of National Intelligence.

Gabbard, a former Democratic congresswoman from Hawaii, has no background in intelligence and a history of making statements about countries like Russia and Syria that have raised questions about her judgment. If Trump gets it, Gabbard will be tasked with overseeing the country’s 16 other intelligence agencies and some of the country’s most secretive national security programs.

“We’re all in a daze,” said one current intelligence official who has worked through several administrations.

Intelligence analysts are most concerned that Gabbard, in her role as director of national intelligence, could be motivated to censor intelligence findings critical of Russia and cut off funding for potentially fruitful investigations. Some intelligence officials are privately considering whether to resign if Gabbard is their new boss.

The Director of National Intelligence is a function that was created in the wake of the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001 to ensure that America’s national security apparatus worked together and shared information about the most critical threats. The job typically requires confirmation from the Senate Intelligence Committee — which in the past has reviewed a candidate’s financial disclosures — and an FBI background check. These reviews are conducted to ensure that a DNI candidate does not have large outstanding debts or ties to foreign governments that could compromise him in coordinating the work of thousands of intelligence officials from the FBI, CIA, NSA and other agencies.

Gabbard’s background is strikingly different from the current director of national intelligence, Avril Haynes, who has a decades-long career working with intelligence agencies. Haynes previously served as deputy director of the CIA in the Obama Administration and was a senior member of Obama’s national security council.

Gabbard has little or no background in intelligence. During her eight years in Congress, she never served on the House Intelligence Committee, instead being assigned to the Armed Services, Foreign Affairs, and Homeland Security committees.

Gabbard emerged as a national figure in 2012 when she became the first Hindu, the first American Samoan and one of the first female combat veterans elected to the chamber. Prior to joining Congress, Gabbard deployed to Iraq in 2004 as part of a Hawaii Army National Guard medical unit and is currently a lieutenant colonel in the US Army Reserve.

Over the past decade, Gabbard has stood out for her foreign policy views. She has long been skeptical of American intelligence analysis and has taken public policy positions that reflect Russian propaganda.

While in Congress in 2017, Gabbard met with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad after the US severed diplomatic ties with the country over its bloody crackdown on its own people. Russia is a longtime supporter of Assad and has provided troops and weapons to support Assad’s government during Syria’s 13-year civil war. Gabbard said the US should not support opposition fighters in the country, who are being assisted by US intelligence services.

Later that year, after the Syrian army attacked civilians with sarin and chlorine in the northern Syrian town of Ltamenah, Gabbard echoed Russian denials that Assad was behind a chemical weapons attack. A united nations the investigation later concluded that the Syrian Air Force dropped the chemicals.

Weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Gabbard posted a video supporting a debunked conspiracy theory that suspected pathogens could be leaking from biolabs in Ukraine, a theory advanced by Russia as part of its attempt of propaganda to press for a ceasefire. Then-Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., said Gabbard embraced “real Russian propaganda” and called it “treasonous.” Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said Gabbard was “spewing fake Russian propaganda.”

It wasn’t the first time Gabbard had been accused of trying to advance Russia’s interests. In 2019, Gabbard launched a long-shot presidential bid that drew favorable coverage from Russian news and propaganda sites. Hillary Clinton suggested the Russians were “care” a Democrat to run as a third-party candidate and help Trump win re-election. It was widely assumed that Clinton was referring to Gabbard, who accused Clinton of trying to “destroy” her reputation.

Two years ago, Gabbard announced that she was leaving the Democratic Party, which she condemned as being “completely under the control of an elitist cabal of warmongers led by a cowardly revivalist.” Last month, she announced at a Donald Trump rally in North Carolina that she is a Republican.

Gabbard hasn’t always supported Trump. She criticized Trump’s decision in 2015 to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, which was supported by the Obama Administration, Iran and Russia, as well as China, France, Germany and Britain. In 2020, Gabbard criticized Trump’s order to kill Iranian General Qassim. Soleimani, who led Iran’s proxy militia program in Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq and Yemen. Gabbard said at the time that Trump had violated the Constitution by removing another country’s top military commander without congressional authorization.

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