What Tulsi Gabbard Has Said About Russia, Ukraine, China
President-elect Donald Trump nominated Tulsi Gabbard to serve as Director of National Intelligence on Wednesday, which has left many wondering about her previous comments regarding foreign relations and national security.
Gabbard, a former Representative for Hawaii and Democratic presidential candidate in 2020, has been a controversial figure when it comes to foreign relations, as she has previously been vocal about her perceptions of threats to national security, and how the U.S. has conducted relationships with other countries.
As the Director of National Intelligence, Gabbard would not only “oversee and direct the implementation of the National Intelligence Program budget,” but would also serve “as the principal advisor to the President, the National Security Council, and the Homeland Security Council for intelligence matters related to national security” according to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s website.
With Gabbard is set to have an integral role in maintaining national security, some her previous statements about the U.S.’ friends and foes have been in the spotlight.
Newsweek has reached out to Gabbard for comment via email.
Gabbard has caused most controversy for her views on Russia and was accused of being a “traitor” after she said that the U.S. had been funding biological laboratories in Ukraine. She said these were being used to conduct research into dangerous pathogens, which bore a resemblance to a Russian conspiracy theory that Ukraine was creating bio weapons. Gabbard had asserted, accurately, that the U.S. funds bio labs in Ukraine, but she did not mention bio weapons labs.
In her 2020 post on what was at the time Twitter and is now known as X, Gabbard said: “Like COVID, these pathogens know no borders. If they are inadvertently or purposely breached or compromised, they will quickly spread all throughout Europe, the United States and the rest of the world, causing untold suffering and death.”
She has been accused of spreading Russian propaganda and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has referred to her as a “Russian asset.”
On another occasion Gabbard expressed what seemed to be support for Russian President Vladimir Putin, tweeting: “Al-Qaeda attacked us on 9/11 and must be defeated. Obama won’t bomb them in Syria. Putin did.”
In a video message on Twitter in 2022, Gabbard said: Dear Presidents Putin, Zelensky, and Biden. It’s time to put geopolitics aside and embrace the spirit of aloha, respect and love, for the Ukrainian people by coming to an agreement that Ukraine will be a neutral country– no military alliance with NATO or Russia—and therefore alleviate the legitimate security concerns of both US and NATO countries as well as Russia, because there would be no Russian or NATO troops on each other’s non-Baltic borders. This would allow the Ukrainian people to live in peace.”
Gabbard also accused Vice President Kamala Harris in October of being the “main instigator” in starting the Russia-Ukraine war and said that her foreign policy had brought the U.S. to “the brink of World War III.”
She also implored Trump to end the “destructive trade war with China” in 2019 and re-posted American investor Ray Dalio’s 2023 LinkedIn post saying China and the U.S. were on the brink of war and calling for peaceful relations with Beijing.
The former Hawaii representative has also raised eyebrows for her stance on Syria, specifically regarding Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who she met in 2017. Assad has been accused of committing human rights violations but Gabbard has voiced her opposition to supporting regime change in Syria.
“Assad is not the enemy of the United States, because Syria does not pose a direct threat to the United States,” Gabbard told MSNBC’s Morning Joe in 2019. “My point is that whether it is Syria or any of these other countries, we need to look at how their interests are counter to or aligned with ours.”
In a tweet about U.S. involvement in the Syrian civil war 2019, Gabbard wrote: “We must bring our troops home from Syria quickly & responsibly. Trump’s announced hasty withdrawal from Syria could leave Kurds vulnerable to slaughter by Turkey’s President Erdogan who has repeatedly threatened to attack them & invade Syrian territory long-held by Syrian Kurds.”
Gabbard has vocally opposed conflict with Iran and Syria and has said that Trump violated the constitution by ordering a drone strike on Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, a senior Iranian military figure, in 2020.
“This was very clearly an act of war by this president without any kind of authorization or declaration of war from Congress, clearly violating the Constitution,” she said on Fox & Friends. “It further escalates this tit for tat that’s going on and on and on, will elicit a very serious response from Iran, and [pushes] us deeper and deeper into this quagmire. And it really begs the question: For what?”
Following the assassination of Soleimani, she posted on Twitter: “We need to get out of Iraq and Syria now. That is the only way that we’re going to prevent ourselves from being dragged into this quagmire, deeper and deeper into a war with Iran.”
Gabbard has also voiced her opposition to U.S. ally Japan’s re-armament, despite rising tensions with an increasingly assertive and aggressive China. In a post on X on December 7, 2023, the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, she wrote: “As we remember Japan’s aggression in the Pacific, we need to ask ourselves this question: is the remilitarization of Japan, which is presently underway, truly a good idea? We need to be careful that shortsighted, self-serving leaders do not end up bringing us again face-to-face with a remilitarized Japan.”
Gabbard was the first Samoan-American member of Congress and served in the Army National Guard for over two decades, where she was deployed to Iraq and Kuwait.
In response to her appointment as Director of National Intelligence, Gabbard wrote on X: “Thank you, @realDonaldTrump, for the opportunity to serve as a member of your cabinet to defend the safety, security and freedom of the American people. I look forward to getting to work.”
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