President Donald Trump has made plenty of bold and unconventional picks over the years, and not all of them have been bad. Sometimes, shaking up the establishment is exactly what Washington needs. But nominating Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence (DNI) is not just a mistake—it’s a dangerous gamble with America’s national security.

Gabbard has built her career on being an anti-establishment crusader, willing to challenge the military-industrial complex, the deep state, and even her former party. But there’s a fine line between being skeptical of Washington elites and being dangerously naïve about America’s adversaries—and Tulsi Gabbard has crossed it.

Over the years, she has parroted Russian propaganda, cozied up to murderous dictators, undermined U.S. intelligence, and shown poor judgment on critical national security issues. Now, she wants to be in charge of America’s 18 intelligence agencies? That should set off alarm bells in every office at the Pentagon, the State Department, and the White House.

If there’s one job where falling for enemy disinformation is unacceptable, it’s Director of National Intelligence. And yet, Tulsi Gabbard has a long history of doing just that.

1. A Record of Being Duped by Russia and Syria

The most alarming thing about Gabbard’s record is how consistently she has been fooled by America’s adversaries.

• In 2017, she took a secret trip to Syria and met with dictator Bashar al-Assad—a brutal tyrant who used chemical weapons on his own people multiple times. Instead of condemning him, she parroted Assad’s propaganda by questioning whether he was even responsible.
• She doubted U.S. and French intelligence, instead relying on the reports of a discredited MIT professor who made basic errors in his analysis. These same “reports” were quickly picked up and amplified by Russia Today (RT), the Kremlin’s state-run propaganda outlet.
• In 2022, when Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, she didn’t blame Putin—she blamed America. She claimed that Russia had “legitimate security concerns” that the Biden administration ignored.

Let’s be clear: No, Russia did not have “legitimate security concerns” that justified invading a sovereign nation, bombing civilians, and triggering the largest war in Europe since World War II. That was Kremlin propaganda, pure and simple.

And yet, Gabbard repeated it. Again. And again. And again.

2. Cozying Up to Traitors and Foreign Spies

One of the biggest red flags in Gabbard’s record is her defense of Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor who stole top-secret U.S. intelligence and fled to Russia, where he now lives under Vladimir Putin’s protection.

• Snowden didn’t just expose government overreach—he compromised national security by leaking intelligence that helped foreign adversaries.
• In 2019, Gabbard co-sponsored a House resolution calling for the U.S. to drop all charges against Snowden—a move so reckless that it went nowhere.
• She also defended Julian Assange, whose organization, WikiLeaks, was used by Russian intelligence to meddle in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

A Director of National Intelligence should be hunting down foreign spies and traitors, not defending them. Gabbard’s willingness to excuse the actions of people who have actively harmed U.S. national security raises serious doubts about whether she’s fit to oversee the very agencies trying to stop these threats.

3. Flip-Flopping on Critical National Security Laws

Gabbard has long opposed Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)—a key tool that allows U.S. intelligence agencies to track foreign terrorists by intercepting their communications.

At her confirmation hearing, however, she suddenly reversed course and claimed that she now supported the law after recent “reforms.”

There’s just one problem:

• In May 2024, one month after these so-called “reforms” passed, she went on Joe Rogan’s podcast and said the changes had actually made things “many, many times worse.”
• But now that she needs Senate votes to get confirmed, she’s suddenly changed her mind?

This is not the principled Tulsi Gabbard who claims to stand on conviction. This is a politician desperately trying to save her nomination—and that should concern anyone who believes America’s top intelligence official needs to have consistency and integrity.

4. The DNI Needs a Tough, Experienced Leader—Not a Gadfly

The Director of National Intelligence is not a job for a political provocateur or a talking head on Fox News. It requires:

✅ Deep experience with intelligence operations
✅ A clear-eyed understanding of foreign threats
✅ The ability to see through disinformation
✅ Steady, principled leadership

Tulsi Gabbard checks none of those boxes.

Instead, she:

❌ Trusted Assad over U.S. intelligence
❌ Repeated Russian propaganda about Ukraine
❌ Defended a fugitive who fled to Moscow with stolen U.S. secrets
❌ Flip-flopped on critical national security issues when it became politically convenient

The truth is, Gabbard is not an intelligence professional. She is not a national security expert. She is a politician with a bad track record of trusting the wrong people and believing the wrong narratives.

And in a job where misreading intelligence can get Americans killed, that’s not a risk we can afford to take.

5. Trump Should Withdraw Her Nomination—Before the Senate Votes Her Down

President Trump has been right to challenge the intelligence establishment when they abuse power. But Tulsi Gabbard is not the person to clean up the system. She is too easily fooled, too inconsistent, and too soft on America’s enemies.

If Trump doesn’t withdraw her nomination, the Senate will almost certainly vote her down. And honestly? They should.

We need a DNI who is:

🔥 Tough on foreign adversaries
🔥 Resistant to enemy disinformation
🔥 Consistent in their national security beliefs
🔥 Loyal to America—not to Snowden, Assad, or Putin

Tulsi Gabbard fails on every count.

It’s time for President Trump to find a better nominee.