Wyden Senate Floor Remarks on Director of National Intelligence Nominee Tulsi Gabbard
As prepared for delivery
Watch a video of Wyden deliver his remarks here
Today, I will be speaking about the nomination of Tulsi Gabbard to be Director of National Intelligence and my reasons for opposing her confirmation.
First, I believe the Senate must consider with this nomination the examples of blatant lawlessness of this administration. At every turn, Donald Trump is attacking the rule of law, disregarding the constitutional role of the Congress, and trying to purge the civil servants who defend this country every day. Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s unvetted minions are gaining access to some of the government’s most sensitive systems and records.
American democracy and national security are at stake and if the Senate is going to confirm nominees we need to know whether they will stand up for democratic principles, no matter what.
So, at her hearing, I asked Ms. Gabbard what she would do if Donald Trump tried to illegally withhold funding from the Intelligence Community Inspector General. This was hardly a hypothetical question. Donald Trump has, in fact, sought to unilaterally cut off funding for a broad range of organizations, despite the money having been appropriated by Congress. And it’s not just me saying this is illegal; the courts have ordered the administration to cut it out and resume the funding. But when I asked Ms. Gabbard this question, she said – quote – “I don't believe for a second President Trump would ask me to do something that would break the law.” Well, he is breaking the law, and this country needs leaders who acknowledge that fact and stand up to him.
My concerns about Ms. Gabbard are also based on her recent turn toward extreme partisanship. Now other partisans have been confirmed to leadership positions in intelligence agencies. George H. W. Bush was the head of the Republican National Committee and he was successful enough as Director of Central Intelligence that they literally named CIA Headquarters after him. Party affiliation is not the issue. The problem is when partisanship distorts one’s views of intelligence matters. Ms. Gabbard has written about a “coup” being perpetrated by the so-called “deep state” that includes, among others, the DNC, and also the FBI, the CIA, and – quote – “a whole network of rogue intelligence and law enforcement agents.”
I have spent almost a quarter century as a member of the Intelligence Committee seeking to bring to light and stop government abuses across a range of programs and activities. These conspiracy theories do not help the bipartisan reform movement. They only serve to encourage a president who wants to tear down the entire Intelligence Community and replace it with loyalists who will commit whatever illegal and abusive acts he asks of them.
So what happens next? If Ms. Gabbard is confirmed, my first order of business will be to hold her to the commitments she made during her confirmation process.
With regard to surveillance policy, she expressed her support for a warrant requirement for U.S. person searches of communications collected under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. With Section 702 reauthorization up next year, DNI support for reforms such as these will be critical to protecting the privacy rights of Americans.
Ms. Gabbard also confirmed that she has significant concerns about the constitutionality of several provisions of the PATRIOT Act.
Importantly, she opposed mandated backdoors into encrypted communications, which threaten both Americans’ privacy and national security. As she stated during her hearing, “these backdoors lead down a dangerous path that can undermine Americans' Fourth Amendment rights and civil liberties.” We are living in a time of increasingly devastating cyber breaches, including the Salt Typhoon compromise of our telecommunications infrastructure. The lesson from that hack was that surveillance capabilities designed for law enforcement will be targeted by foreign intelligence services. In other words, there is simply no way for the government to mandate access to Americans’ encrypted communications and not also expose those communications to the government of China or other adversaries.
It’s alarming that just last week the press reported that UK officials insisted that Apple provide them a back door into files backed up to Apple’s iCloud service. This is a development that threatens American national security and Americans’ privacy. And that’s even before U.S. government officials come around, once again, asking for the same dangerous and irresponsible accesses. That’s why Ms. Gabbard’s statement was so important and why, if she is confirmed, Congress needs to hold her, and the rest of America’s intelligence agencies, to it.
During her confirmation process, Ms. Gabbard supported restrictions on the collection of communications records of journalists. She endorsed the Biden Administration Justice Department’s policy prohibiting this collection except in very narrow circumstances, a policy she said was “essential to protecting press freedoms and maintaining the critical balance between national security and upholding the First Amendment.” She also called for the codification of that policy.
I asked Ms. Gabbard about the collection of communications records of congressional members and staff, as was detailed in a Department of Justice Inspector General report released late last year. She agreed that this spying on Congress was a “significant breach of the constitution and separation of powers,” and endorsed reforms to prevent it from happening again.
During this confirmation process, she confirmed her belief that the Government Accountability Office should audit the Intelligence Community to ensure it is not targeting Americans outside of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. She also expressed support for the Public Interest Declassification Board, which is tasked with promoting transparency
And finally, I asked Ms. Gabbard whether intelligence agency whistleblowers must have a clear path to the Senate Intelligence Committee and don't need permission from agencies to talk to us. She responded that the answer was “clearly yes.” Given Donald Trump’s ongoing attacks on public servants defending the rule of law, the protection of whistleblowers may be one of the most important principles of all.
In just three short weeks since his inauguration, here’s the checks and balances scoreboard on President Trump. He has illegally fired Inspectors General. He has purged the three Democratic members of the independent Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, not only removing the most pro-privacy members but leaving the Board without enough members to function. He has appointed or nominated people to carry out political retribution, including a nominee to be FBI Director who comes with his own published enemies list. At the same time, Donald Trump has demonstrated thorough contempt for the security of Americans’ private information by granting Elon Musk’s people unsupervised access to the country’s most sensitive systems and databases.
So what will happen when he attempts to steamroll oversight and the rule of law and put the privacy and constitutional rights of all Americans at risk? If she is confirmed, it will be up to Ms. Gabbard to stand up to him and stick to the principles and commitments she has expressed. And it will be our responsibility to see that she does.
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