President Trump’s get to direct the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, has never been nervous about sharing her accusations of America’s security position. So it was surprising when some of its strongest supporters grilled her on the subject during her Thursday Senate assurance reading.
Senators repeatedly asked Gabbard to defend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act ( FISA ), which intel agencies abused to spy on unsuspecting Americans and , while he was testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
As The Federalist’s Logan Washburn just reported,” Part 702 , of the policy allows governmental agencies to gather communications of noncitizens, outside the state,  , without a subpoena”. It also” supposedly bars the state from spying on Americans”, Washburn noted,” but the CIA was  , caught , in 2022 using the law — which Congressional Republicans reauthorized last yr— to detective on Americans”.
While serving in Congress, Gabbard co-sponsored regulations alongside Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., that sought to revolution FISA and withdraw the Patriot Act. She has since been all but forced to change , her place on FISA, evidently to get help from some Democratic lawmakers.
Gabbard was asked about her evolving location on the rules by the agency’s performance part, Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va. But when Gabbard attempted to answer Warner’s topic about which FISA Section 702 measures she supports, the Virginia Democrat cut her away and doesn’t allow her to accomplish.
Warner also provided the Army former with instruction on her controversial perspectives on FISA. GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Mike Rounds of South Dakota appeared to have made an attempt to softly coerce Gabbard into defending the laws.
” I want to give you an opportunity in front of this committee, to share your position, in your own words, about … how much it is needed with regard to the continuation of]FISA ] 702 and your support for it”, Rounds said.
Without this ability, there are a number of places where we would be deaf from a national safety standpoint. Additionally, it may occur in addition to existing safeguards to protect American ‘ legal rights, Gabbard retorted.
Best Senate Republicans Reject Bondi’s request to support an FISA-based spying system.
During the Thursday hear, Gabbard was questioned on a number of different subjects, not just the security of FISA. Senators have even brought up Edward Snowden, a journalist and company for the then-National Security Agency, who leaking classified information in 2013.
As Rachel Bovard recently wrote in these pages, Snowden unearthed the existence of the PRISM plan,” a constitutionally dubious security program” used by U. S. intel agencies to “gather and search through the emails, internet calls, photos, and chats of Americans without obtaining a warrant, often through the backdoor of America’s big tech companies”.
When Warner asked her whether she believed Snowden’s actions were “brave,” Gabbard argued that she “broke the law” and that she “does never agree with or support the release of any of the information and intelligence he possessed nor the manner in which he acted.” She immediately noted, however, that Snowden “also … released data that exposed severe, unlawful, and unlawful programs that are happening within our federal that led to serious reforms that Congress undertook”.
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, was informed by Gabbard, who has previously praised Snowden for his actions, that she would not advocate for Snowden’s pardon if he was declared DNI.
Those answers apparently weren’t good enough for Sens. James Lankford, R-Okla., Todd Young, R-Ind., and Michael Bennet, D-Colo., all of whom effectively hounded Gabbard to disavow Snowden as a” traitor”.
Whatever one’s opinions are on Snowden and his actions, the committee’s obsession with the subject and its advocacy of FISA without taking into account the numerous documented abuses by America’s intelligence services are appalling. These highly politicized organizations have victimized Americans, many of whom have clearly changed their focus from focusing on Democrats ‘ domestic political opponents to focusing on their own.
In addition to spying on Trump’s 2016 campaign, agencies such as the FBI were instrumental in fomenting the debunked Russia collusion hoax, spying on Catholics, targeting Trump supporters and parents at school board meetings, arresting pro-lifers, and partaking in a whole host of other egregious abuses. And who could forget the infamous letter signed by 51 former intel officials, who falsely claimed contents from Hunter Biden’s laptop exposing the Biden family’s foreign business dealings were part of a Russian “disinformation” campaign.
It is scandalous that so many elected senators, especially Republican ones, largely ignore Gabbard’s request to explain how she would stop such politicization and stop it from occurring in the future. It’s a clear indication that they’re much more concerned with fixing these broken institutions than fixing them, if anything.
Gabbard has a right to be skeptical of the extensive surveillance capabilities that America’s intelligence apparatuses possess. Any” Republican” who isn’t has no business being in public office.
Shawn Fleetwood is a University of Mary Washington graduate and a staff writer for The Federalist. He previously served as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClear Health, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
