Gabbard vows to 'aggressively pursue' intel leakers
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said the Trump administration would be “aggressively pursuing” people who leak information to journalists, accusing those sharing such information of being “politically motivated.”
“Our nation’s Intelligence Community must be focused on our national security mission. Politically motivated leaks undermine our national security and the trust of the American people, and will not be tolerated,” Gabbard wrote on X.
“Unfortunately, such leaks have become commonplace with no investigation or accountability. That ends now. We know of and are aggressively pursuing recent leakers from within the Intelligence Community and will hold them accountable.”
In her post on X, Gabbard named leading mainstream media outlets like The Washington Post, NBC News, HuffPost and national security publication The Record as having been on the receiving end of leaked sensitive information. The outlets did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The comment raises questions about the extent the Trump administration will wield its power to go after those that leak to the media.
Under the first Trump administration, Trump’s team went to extraordinary lengths to track down leakers, even clandestinely gaining access to phone and email records of journalists from three outlets in an attempt to weed out their source.
The effort was revealed when the Biden administration moved to end gag orders that had been placed on the communications companies, allowing for the alert of the news outlets. The Justice Department later updated its policy to limit the ability of prosecutors to tap journalist records, but that guidance can easily be rescinded.
Others in the Trump administration have similarly shared the president’s disdain for leakers. FBI Director Kash Patel has also suggested the administration would “come after” journalists as well, though he did not specify whether that would be in relation to leaks.
“We’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections,” Patel said in a 2023 podcast interview. “Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out.”
Patel’s appointment to lead the FBI has sparked concern among press freedom groups and some of the nation’s top journalists who have said they fear the bureau could be used as a mechanism to intimidate critical press coverage of the administration.
Gabbard, however, has previously expressed sympathy for NSA leaker Edward Snowden, and during her time in Congress called on Trump to pardon him.
Gabbard has since shifted gears, saying her stance on Snowden was based on concern he did not have sufficient internal channels to act as a whistleblower.
In her X post, Gabbard provided little insight into why she felt the leaks were politically motivated.
She cited the sharing of classified information on Israel and Iran as well as the U.S.-Russia relationship. In one case she did not cite the specifics of a story, saying only that someone has been sharing information with the Huffington Post.
“Any unauthorized release of classified information is a violation of the law and will be treated as such,” she said.
Gabbard came to Trump’s administration as a public figure who was well-versed in the media ecosystem. She appeared regularly on cable news channels to advocate for the president along the campaign trail and was a Fox News contributor and fill-in host before joining the Republican party after serving nearly a decade in Congress as a Democrat.