However, Trump may seek to change that, based on suggestions in Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s blueprint for a second Trump presidency. In the Intelligence Community chapter, the document proposes that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence be the sole agency drafting Trump’s daily intelligence briefing and should have full oversight of the entire intelligence community’s budget.
Since Gabbard’s nomination for the Office of Director of National Intelligence was announced, several Democratic lawmakers have criticized the decision, citing Gabbard’s lack of experience in the intelligence community and her questionable views on Russia and Syria.
Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger, a member of the House Intelligence Committee from Virginia, Written on X She was dismayed by Tulsi Gabbard’s nomination, adding: “Not only is she unprepared and unqualified, but she traffics in conspiracy theories and cozys up to dictators like Bashar al-Assad and Vladimir Putin.”
Gabbard has a long history of espousing controversial views on foreign policy as well as being associated with conspiracy theories.
Gabbard has been associated for years with an extremist offshoot of the Hare Krishna movement, called the Identity Foundation. The group includes some former members It has been described as a cultled by Chris Butler, who is worshiped as a god by some of his followers and whom Gabbard worships She is described as her “mentor”.
She gained a level of national notoriety in 2017 when she personally met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during what her office described as a “fact-finding” mission in the Middle East. She later raised doubts about US intelligence agencies’ assessment that the Assad regime had used chemical weapons against civilians, and described US air strikes against Syrian targets in response to the chemical attacks as “reckless and short-sighted”.
Upon leaving the Democratic Party in 2022, she criticized it using phrases reminiscent of the coded language used by QAnon followers, and described her former party as an “elitist cabal of warmongers” driven by “cowardly vigilantism.”
In 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, Gabbard made comments that some interpreted as justifying Putin’s decision, claiming that if the United States had “simply acknowledged Russia’s legitimate security concerns” regarding Ukraine’s bid to join NATO, war could have been avoided.
She also made comments that were used to fuel a Russia-backed conspiracy theory that US-funded biolabs in Ukraine would be used to launch biological weapons. When Trump announced Gabbard as his choice of presenters for Russian state television DNI celebrate News.
In 2022, Gabbard also campaigned for Cary Lake in her unsuccessful race for governor of Arizona. Lake was at that point one of the most vocal supporters of election denial conspiracy theories about Trump’s election loss in 2020, and would spend years claiming, without evidence, that her loss in 2022 was due to election fraud.
Gabbard did not respond to repeated requests for comment on her connections to Willis, but in an interview last April she mentioned the fact that she was visiting the border and filming a documentary, though she did not mention Willis’ involvement.
“I just got back last night after a few days at the border in California. It’s a part of the border in our country that hasn’t gotten a lot of attention,” Gabbard told The New York Times. Kelsey Sheerin’s perspective Podcast. “I’m putting together a short documentary. I went there and brought my husband, who’s a cinematographer, and some cameras specifically, because most people in America don’t know what’s going on.