Politics
Column: Tulsi Gabbard as intelligence czar? The Trump Cabinet pick most likely to fail
WASHINGTON — Tulsi Gabbard, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to oversee the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies, is a woman of strong views, vigorously expressed.
A former Bernie Sanders Democrat, she now says the Democratic Party is controlled by “an elitist cabal of warmongers” that includes “rogue intelligence and law enforcement agents.” President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, she wrote recently, are merely puppets of that cabal.
A staunch anti-interventionist who opposes almost any use of U.S. military force, the former congresswoman from Hawaii blames Biden — not Vladimir Putin — for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
All of which echoes Trump’s views, especially his conviction that the FBI, CIA and other national security agencies have plotted ceaselessly against him.
On the other hand, during Trump’s first term in the White House, she also complained that he was too tough on Iran and denounced him for acting like “Saudi Arabia’s bitch.”
This year, though, she rallied to his side and endorsed him for promising to seek a thaw with Russia. She was a frequent, telegenic surrogate for his campaign on Fox News. No wonder Trump decided she was the perfect choice to guard the nation’s secrets as director of national intelligence.
National security veterans from both parties are not only unimpressed; they’re alarmed.
“We normally look for demonstrated competence in a nominee,” said Gregory F. Treverton, a former top intelligence official during the Obama administration who now teaches at USC. “This is a case of demonstrated incompetence. … She was obviously selected solely because she’s loyal to Trump.”
“I think she’s a serious threat to our national security,” John Bolton, who served as Trump’s national security advisor during his first term, said in a television interview. “Her judgment is nonexistent.”
Among Republicans in the Senate, Gabbard’s nomination elicited a few glowing endorsements — but an impressive list of noncommittal statements.
“That’s a nominee that illustrates the importance of a full background check,” said Susan Collins of Maine, one of the GOP senators who helped sink the nomination of former Rep. Matt Gaetz for attorney general last month.
Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma said he “will have a lot of questions.” “It’s really important that we have leadership there that’s able to support” the intelligence agencies, he added.
Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, formerly the GOP’s second-ranking Senate leader, gave a speech praising most of Trump’s national security nominees by name — but left Gabbard conspicuously off the list. A Cornyn aide declined to say whether the omission was deliberate.
To Senate-watchers, the meaning of all that terseness was clear: If any of Trump’s nominees are in danger, Gabbard is at the top of the list.
Her long record as a foreign policy dissident under both Democratic and Republican presidents will give Senate hawks plenty to scrutinize — and, perhaps, to excoriate.
She not only blamed Biden for Russia’s war on Ukraine (she claims he failed to acknowledge Putin’s “legitimate security concerns” and demanded the United States cut off military aid to Kyiv. She also charged that the U.S. was funding dangerous biological laboratories in Ukraine — “parroting fake Russian propaganda,” Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah complained.
On the Syrian civil war, Gabbard opposed U.S. aid to the rebels fighting the brutal regime of Bashar Assad, met with the authoritarian leader and defended him against the allegations that he used chemical weapons on his own people. Assad, who is propped up by military aid from Iran and Russia, “is not the enemy of the United States,” she said.
She defended Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, who were indicted for masterminding two of the biggest leaks of intelligence secrets in U.S. history — a position unlikely to endear her to intelligence community professionals or hawks in the Senate.
Gabbard also criticized Trump during his first term for military intervention, including for bombing Syrian government forces in 2017 in retaliation for Assad’s use of chemical weapons against civilians.
She condemned Trump for ordering the assassination of Iran’s Gen. Qassem Soleimani in 2020, and for imposing harsh economic sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program. She also excoriated Trump for supporting Saudi Arabia’s authoritarian regime in exchange for military purchases — the reason she called him “Saudi Arabia’s bitch.”
Trump does not appear to have held any of that against her — especially after she began campaigning for him. And, of course, he shares Gabbard’s view of the CIA as a rogue agency that needs to be brought to heel.
That’s the core of the problem with her nomination, Treverton argues.
“She’s going to be at war with the intelligence community,” he said. “She’ll politicize it in ways that are obvious and not obvious.”
Intelligence, he added, is an area in which political loyalty is not always a cardinal virtue.
“If the president surrounds himself with yes-men and yes-women, that’s dangerous,” he said. “You need to encourage intelligence officers to come forward with bad news, instead of telling leaders only what they want to hear.”
Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the former Senate leader, has said he plans to use his remaining time in the Senate to oppose the rising isolationism in his party.
He has criticized Trump’s foreign policy slogan, “America First,” as similar to “the language they used in the ‘20s and ‘30s.” He has said pushing back against Putin and his allies, especially in Ukraine, must be a top priority — no matter what Trump and Gabbard think.
There are at least a dozen national security Republicans in the Senate — “Reagan Republicans,” in McConnell’s words — who share that view. With the GOP holding a 53-47 majority, it would take only four to sink a nomination.
Will McConnell and other Russia hawks have the courage of their convictions? This nomination would be a good place to start.
Politics
Federal judge blocks Trump from cutting childcare funds to Democratic states over fraud concerns
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A federal judge Friday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from stopping subsidies on childcare programs in five states, including Minnesota, amid allegations of fraud.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian, a Biden appointee, didn’t rule on the legality of the funding freeze, but said the states had met the legal threshold to maintain the “status quo” on funding for at least two weeks while arguments continue.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said it would withhold funds for programs in five Democratic states over fraud concerns.
The programs include the Child Care and Development Fund, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, and the Social Services Block Grant, all of which help needy families.
USDA IMMEDIATELY SUSPENDS ALL FEDERAL FUNDING TO MINNESOTA AMID FRAUD INVESTIGATION
On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it would withhold funds for programs in five Democratic states over fraud concerns. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
“Families who rely on childcare and family assistance programs deserve confidence that these resources are used lawfully and for their intended purpose,” HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill said in a statement on Tuesday.
The states, which include California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and New York, argued in court filings that the federal government didn’t have the legal right to end the funds and that the new policy is creating “operational chaos” in the states.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian at his nomination hearing in 2022. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
In total, the states said they receive more than $10 billion in federal funding for the programs.
HHS said it had “reason to believe” that the programs were offering funds to people in the country illegally.
‘TIP OF THE ICEBERG’: SENATE REPUBLICANS PRESS GOV WALZ OVER MINNESOTA FRAUD SCANDAL
The table above shows the five states and their social safety net funding for various programs which are being withheld by the Trump administration over allegations of fraud. (AP Digital Embed)
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading the lawsuit, called the ruling a “critical victory for families whose lives have been upended by this administration’s cruelty.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading the lawsuit, called the ruling a “critical victory for families whose lives have been upended by this administration’s cruelty.” (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
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Fox News Digital has reached out to HHS for comment.
In what might be the most decisive critique yet of President Trump’s remake of the Kennedy Center, the Washington National Opera’s board approved a resolution on Friday to leave the venue it has occupied since 1971.
“Today, the Washington National Opera announced its decision to seek an amicable early termination of its affiliation agreement with the Kennedy Center and resume operations as a fully independent nonprofit entity,” the company said in a statement to the Associated Press.
Roma Daravi, Kennedy Center’s vice president of public relations, described the relationship with Washington National Opera as “financially challenging.”
“After careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to part ways with the WNO due to a financially challenging relationship,” Daravi said in a statement. “We believe this represents the best path forward for both organizations and enables us to make responsible choices that support the financial stability and long-term future of the Trump Kennedy Center.”
Kennedy Center President Ambassador Richard Grenell tweeted that the call was made by the Kennedy Center, writing that its leadership had “approached the Opera leadership last year with this idea and they began to be open to it.”
“Having an exclusive relationship has been extremely expensive and limiting in choice and variety,” Grenell wrote. “We have spent millions of dollars to support the Washington Opera’s exclusivity and yet they were still millions of dollars in the hole – and getting worse.”
WNO’s decision to vacate the Kennedy Center’s 2,364-seat Opera House comes amid a wave of artist cancellations that came after the venue’s board voted to rename the center the Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. New signage featuring Trump’s name went up on the building’s exterior just days after the vote while debate raged over whether an official name change could be made without congressional approval.
That same day, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) — an ex officio member of the board — wrote on social media that the vote was not unanimous and that she and others who might have voiced their dissent were muted on the call.
Grenell countered that ex officio members don’t get a vote.
Cancellations soon began to mount — as did Kennedy Center‘s rebukes against the artists who chose not to appear. Jazz drummer Chuck Redd pulled out of his annual Christmas Eve concert; jazz supergroup the Cookers nixed New Year’s Eve shows; New York-based Doug Varone and Dancers dropped out of April performances; and Grammy Award-winning banjo player Béla Fleck wrote on social media that he would no longer play at the venue in February.
WNO’s departure, however, represents a new level of artist defection. The company’s name is synonymous with the Kennedy Center and it has served as an artistic center of gravity for the complex since the building first opened.
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Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is leveling a stunning accusation at Vice President JD Vance amid the national furor over this week’s fatal shooting in Minnesota involving an ICE agent.
“I understand that Vice President Vance believes that shooting a young mother of three in the face three times is an acceptable America that he wants to live in, and I do not,” the four-term federal lawmaker from New York and progressive champion argued as she answered questions on Friday on Capitol Hill from Fox News and other news organizations.
Ocasio-Cortez spoke in the wake of Wednesday’s shooting death of 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good after she confronted ICE agents from inside her car in Minneapolis.
RENEE NICOLE GOOD PART OF ‘ICE WATCH’ GROUP, DHS SOURCES SAY
Members of law enforcement work the scene following a suspected shooting by an ICE agent during federal operations on January 7, 2026, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
Video of the incident instantly went viral, and while Democrats have heavily criticized the shooting, the Trump administration is vocally defending the actions of the ICE agent.
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Vance, at a White House briefing on Thursday, charged that “this was an attack on federal law enforcement. This was an attack on law and order.”
“That woman was there to interfere with a legitimate law enforcement operation,” the vice president added. “The president stands with ICE, I stand with ICE, we stand with all of our law enforcement officers.”
And Vance claimed Good was “brainwashed” and suggested she was connected to a “broader, left-wing network.”
Federal sources told Fox News on Friday that Good, who was a mother of three, worked as a Minneapolis-based immigration activist serving as a member of “ICE Watch.”
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Ocasio-Cortez, in responding to Vance’s comments, said, “That is a fundamental difference between Vice President Vance and I. I do not believe that the American people should be assassinated in the street.”
But a spokesperson for the vice president, responding to Ocasio-Cortez’s accusation, told Fox News Digital, “On National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day, AOC made it clear she thinks that radical leftists should be able to mow down ICE officials in broad daylight. She should be ashamed of herself. The Vice President stands with ICE and the brave men and women of law enforcement, and so do the American people.”
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