PULLING STRINGS

Trump Intel Nominee Tulsi Gabbard: ‘I Am No One’s Puppet’

But she repeatedly refused to answer whether Edward Snowden is a traitor during Thursday’s confirmation hearing.

Tulsi Gabbard insisted Thursday she’s no one’s “puppet” and pushed back against senators’ accusations that she supports foreign dictators and a famous U.S. whistleblower who fled to Russia.

Gabbard, President Donald Trump’s choice to become director of national intelligence, repeatedly refused to answer a question posed by several members of the Senate Intelligence Committee considering her nomination.

“Is Edward Snowden a traitor?” Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) asked, noting that the GOP chairman of the committee has called Snowden a traitor.

Gabbard didn’t directly answer the question, as Bennet grew visibly angry.

“Yes or no?!” Bennet fumed. “Is Edward Snowden a traitor to the United States of America?”

Republican Sen. Todd Young gently admonished Gabbard, telling her it would benefit her prospects of confirmation if she would simply say whether the “greatest whistleblower in American security, so called, harmed national security.”

Snowden, the U.S. defense contractor who disclosed highly classified information about American intelligence gathering and who now lives in Russia, became the flashpoint of the hearing.

Sen. Susan Collins, a crucial holdout Republican who could decide whether Gabbard’s nomination advances to the Senate floor or is doomed in committee, also grilled the nominee about her past comments championing Snowden as a hero.

The Maine Republican asked Gabbard if she would move to pardon or grant clemency to Snowden if she overcomes the senators’ concerns and becomes director of national intelligence.

“My responsibility would be to ensure the security of our nation’s secrets, and would not take actions to advocate for any actions related to Snowden,” Gabbard replied.

Collins asked Gabbard about speculation that she has met with leaders of the Iranian-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah. “Have you ever knowingly met with any members, leaders or affiliates of Hezbollah?” Collins asked.

“No, and it is an absurd accusation,” Gabbard said.

Senators on both sides of the aisle raised concerns about the former Democratic congresswoman, whose past connection to the spiritual leader of a “personality cult” has come under scrutiny, and some painted the 43-year-old nominee as naive.

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But senators on the powerful committee that will determine her fate as Trump’s pick for the top national intelligence job were focused on her ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and now-deposed Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.

“Rather than standing up to dictators like Putin and Assad, you sometimes amplify their talking points,” Sen. Mark Warner, the lead Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, told her during the tense hearing. Warner, as others, raised her past comments suggesting NATO—not Russia—was responsible for the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine

“Putin started the war in Ukraine,” she conceded at one point.

“I appreciate this late conversion but I’m not sure I buy it,” Warner said.

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Gabbard pushed back early against her Democratic critics, insisting she’s a loyal American who loves her country.

“Those who oppose my nomination imply that I am loyal to something or someone other than God, my own conscience and the Constitution of the United States. Accusing me of being Trump’s puppet, Putin’s puppet, Assad’s puppet, a guru’s puppet, Modi’s puppet, not recognizing the absurdity of simultaneously being the puppet of five different puppet masters,” she said.

Senate Intelligence Chairman Tom Cotton defended Gabbard against public implications about her sympathetic views on Russia and Syria.

“She has undergone five FBI background checks,” he said, adding that he personally reviewed “more than 300 pages” of her file.

“It’s clean as a whistle,” Cotton said.

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Mary Ann AkersWashington Bureau Chief

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