Newsman: The US Senate confirmed Tulsi Gabbard to be the US director of national intelligence on Wednesday. The Senate voted 52-48 to confirmed the former congresswoman in charge of the U.S. intelligence community.
The vote was largely along party lines, with nearly all Republicans present voting in favor of Gabbard. Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the former longtime GOP leader who has clashed with Trump, was the only Republican who joined all Democrats in voting against her.
The director of national intelligence oversees the 18 agencies that make up the U.S. intelligence community, including the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency. The DNI also advises the president on intelligence matters.
Tulshi Gabbard, 43, an Iraq war veteran, has served for more than two decades in the Army Reserve. She had been a longtime Hawaii Democrat, serving in the state House and on the Honolulu City Council. She went on to represent Hawaii in the House of Representatives from 2013 to 2021. After she unsuccessfully ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, Gabbard endorsed Joe Biden over Trump.
But she soured on the Biden administration and left the Democratic Party in 2022. Last October, Gabbard announced she was joining the Republican Party and endorsed Trump, appearing with him on the campaign trail in the run-up to the 2024 election.
