Tulsi Gabbard: Trump’s new intelligence chief backed Kremlin conspiracy theories
The position was created in the aftermath of 9/11, and has never been held by a politician with such contempt for the intelligence activities they oversee.
In 2015, Ms Gabbard raised eyebrows at the CIA, when she tried to introduce legislation to block the agency’s activities in Syria. The plan was blocked by congressional committees.
Four years later, she called on the US government to drop charges against Julian Assange, the Australian journalist and Wikileaks founder who published thousands of classified intelligence documents on the internet. She then called for the pardoning of Edward Snowdon, an NSA employee who supplied much of the material
She has also pushed a Kremlin-backed conspiracy theory that Ukraine was developing US-backed biological weapons laboratories.
These positions will not make her popular in the US intelligence community, and her appointment is likely to face significant opposition in the Senate before Mr Trump takes office next year.
