Tulsi Gabbard is set to become director of national intelligence after the Senate voted Wednesday morning to confirm her to President Donald Trump’s cabinet.
Sen. Mitch McConnell was the lone Republican to join all the Democrats in the Senate in voting against Gabbard. McConnell also voted against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s nomination last month.
“The nation should not have to worry that the intelligence assessments the President receives are tainted by a Director of National Intelligence with a history of alarming lapses in judgment,” the senator said in a statement after the Gabbard vote.
But McConnell’s opposition wasn’t enough to tank Gabbard, who was confirmed in a 52-48 vote.
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Gabbard has vowed that one of her first steps as director of national intelligence will be to cut down the size and scope of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. That was something multiple senators brought up during her confirmation hearing in front of the Intelligence Committee last month and a goal that’s in line with the Trump administration’s quest to reduce the size and abilities of the federal government.
Gabbard’s confirmation process was one marked by fiery questioning from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, as well as pressure from Vice President JD Vance and other members of Trump’s orbit for hesitant senators to do the president’s bidding.
The final confirmation vote was a sign that the pressure worked.
Several senators cited Gabbard’s commitment to downsizing ODNI as one of the factors that secured their votes for her, including Sens. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, both of whom have voted against other Trump nominees this year and were initially viewed as potential holdouts on Gabbard.
Sen. John Curtis, the other Republican who publicly expressed hesitation about voting for Gabbard, also fell in line with his party.
Sen. Bill Cassidy said in a statement that he would “trust President Trump on this decision” and vote for Gabbard.
In a floor speech before the vote Senate Majority Leader John Thune applauded Gabbard (and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.), saying she “had the temerity to come out and support positions that perhaps ran contrary to some of the positions held by particularly the progressive wing of the Democrat Party in this country.”
Multiple Democratic senators made speeches on the Senate floor on Tuesday evening lambasting Gabbard’s history and past stances, including a visit with former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and a flip on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that several senators have cast doubt on.
“I want to know that the person who is going to be woken up in the middle of the night to make those last-minute decisions … that they are someone, again, of competence, of character,” said Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a former Middle East intelligence analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency, which falls under ODNI. “What I have seen from Ms. Gabbard does not meet that threshold.”
Others questioned Gabbard’s ability to act without succumbing to political pressure. During her Intelligence Committee hearing, Gabbard refused to explicitly say if she would accept an illegal order from Trump.
“The nominee will put loyalty to Donald Trump first, and my apprehension is that if there is information that he does not want or wants it interpreted a certain way, there will be excessive deference to the pressures that the president has shown,” Sen. Peter Welch said.
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Shifra Dayak is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.
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