Donald Trump Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard offered a new and changing account Thursday of why she attended last week’s FBI raid on an election center in Georgia, saying she went at the urging of Attorney General Pam Bondi.
“She took a lot of heat two days ago because she went in under Pam’s pressure,” the US president said at the National Prayer Breakfast, a high-profile event for political and religious leaders. “She went in and saw the votes she wanted to check Georgia.”
The comments contradicted Trump’s statement a day earlier that he did not know why Gabbard showed up. FBI Attacked, she diverted to lawmakers from her account that she was headed to Fulton County in the direction of the Trump Express.
Transfer descriptions intensified scrutiny of the unusual role Gabbard played in the operation. As Director of National Intelligence, she has no domestic law enforcement authority, and her presence in an FBI raid is not uncommon.
A departure from comments on Trump’s account was noted at the prayer breakfast Interview with NBC News on wednesday “I don’t know,” Trump said when asked why Gabbard attended, without providing evidence that China interfered in the 2020 election.
Asked about the apparent discrepancy at Thursday’s White House briefing, White House Press Secretary Carolyn Leavitt said Trump’s comments in the NBC interview were taken out of context.
“He’s right, as I told you, election security is essential to national security. We need to make sure our elections are free and fair and free from foreign interference,” Leavitt said.
“So you’re taking the first three words he says to a question and not looking at his entire response.”
Her explanation, however, obscured a key distinction: While Gabbard has the authority to oversee intelligence assessments related to election security, she has no formal role in domestic law enforcement operations.
The statement also contradicted a letter Gabbard sent Wednesday to senior lawmakers in the House and Senate, in which she said she attended the raid at Trump’s behest and only briefly.
“My presence was requested by the President and exercised under my broad statutory authority to coordinate, integrate, and analyze intelligence related to election security,” Gabbard wrote.
The Guardian previously reported Gabbard is conducting her own review of the 2020 election through her office with Trump’s approval — working separately from the Justice Department investigation — and was sent to look into the attack as part of that effort.
That review comes as Trump renews his focus on the 2020 election, nearly six years after losing to Joe Biden. Gabbard has been briefing Trump and top advisers every few weeks for several weeks, two administration officials familiar with the matter said.
Both Gabbard and the Justice Department’s investigations into the 2020 election — underscoring its importance to Trump and sending Gabbard on the offensive — have shown an interest in claims of voting machine manipulation, which Trump has cited as stealing the election.
