What to know about Tulsi Gabbard, Trump's pick to be director of national intelligence

[November 14, 2024]  By MEG KINNARD and DAVID KLEPPER

WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump has tapped former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard to be the next director of national intelligence, a powerful position that sits atop the nation's spy agencies and acts as the president's top intelligence adviser.

Gabbard is a veteran who served for more than two decades but doesn't have the typical intelligence experience of past officeholders. She left the Democratic Party in 2022 and endorsed Trump earlier this year, becoming popular among his supporters.

Here are a few things to know about Gabbard:

She was the first Hindu elected to Congress

Gabbard, 43, was born in the U.S. territory of American Samoa, raised in Hawaii and spent a year of her childhood in the Philippines. She was first elected as a 21-year-old to Hawaii's House of Representatives but had to leave after one term when her National Guard unit deployed to Iraq.

She was later elected to Congress representing Hawaii. As the first Hindu member of the House, Gabbard was sworn into office with her hand on the Bhagavad Gita, the Hindu devotional work. She was also the first American Samoan elected to Congress.

During her four House terms she became known for speaking out against her party's leadership. Her early support for Sen. Bernie Sanders ’ 2016 Democratic presidential primary run made her a popular figure in progressive politics nationally.

Gabbard is married to cinematographer Abraham Williams. Her father, Mike Gabbard, is a state senator who was first elected as a Republican but who switched parties to become a Democrat.

She ran for president — then left her party

Gabbard sought the Democratic nomination for president in 2020 on a progressive platform and her opposition to U.S. involvement in foreign military conflicts.

Citing her military experience, she argued that U.S. wars in the Middle East had destabilized the region, made the U.S. less safe and cost thousands of American lives. She blamed her own party for not opposing the wars. During one primary debate, she criticized then-Sen. Kamala Harris’ record as a prosecutor.

Gabbard later dropped out of the race and endorsed the ultimate winner, President Joe Biden.

Two years later she left the Democratic Party to become an independent, saying her old party was dominated by an “elitist cabal of warmongers” and “woke” ideologues. She subsequently campaigned for several high-profile Republicans, became a contributor to Fox News and started a podcast.

“Today’s Democratic Party is unrecognizable from the party I joined 20 years ago," she said when explaining her decision.

She's a star in Trump world

Gabbard endorsed Trump earlier this year, and her support quickly made her popular among Trump's supporters.

Often appearing alongside Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — who challenged Biden for the Democratic nomination before transitioning to an independent bid, then ultimately endorsing Trump — Gabbard represented what Trump argued was his appeal across the political spectrum.

Gabbard helped Trump prep for his own debate against Harris this year. In October, while stumping with Trump at a rally in North Carolina, she announced that she was officially becoming a Republican, calling the current Democratic Party “completely unrecognizable” compared to the one of which she had been a member.

Trump has given both Gabbard and Kennedy roles in his presidential transition, potentially giving them the influence to help staff his administration and shape the policies the federal bureaucracy would pursue if he returns to the White House.

She's a veteran, but not an intelligence insider

Gabbard has served in the Army National Guard for more than two decades and deployed to Iraq and Kuwait.

She received a Combat Medical Badge in 2005 for “participation in combat operations under enemy hostile fire in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom III,” the Hawaii National Guard said.

Unlike past directors, she hasn't held any senior government roles. She served for two years on the House Homeland Security Committee.

The current director, Avril Haines, was confirmed by the Senate in 2021 following several years in a number of top national security and intelligence positions. Haines was the first woman to serve in the position.

She'll oversee Trump's possible intelligence overhaul

Trump has said he wants to overhaul the nation's intelligence services — a sector of the federal government he has long viewed with suspicion and distrust. The president-elect has blamed U.S. intelligence agencies of seeking to undermine his first administration as well as his campaigns.

He's also characterized the intelligence community as part of the “deep state,” his term for thousands of civil servants who work at a long list of government agencies and who Trump has never viewed as sufficiently loyal.

“We will clean out all of the corrupt actors in our national security and intelligence apparatus, and there are plenty of them,” Trump said in 2023 while laying out his priorities for a second term. “The departments and agencies that have been weaponized will be completely overhauled.”

The office of the director was created in 2004 as part of a series of changes to U.S. intelligence following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Lawmakers hoped that the new office would prevent intelligence failures by streamlining interagency cooperation.

The office played a key role in the government’s efforts to identify and expose efforts by Russia, China and Iran to spread false and misleading claims about voting and democracy ahead of last week’s U.S. election. Other divisions focus on cyberthreats, counterterrorism and counterespionage.

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