Tulsi Gabbard Stages Comeback With Twin Controversies — Whistleblower Complaint and Sneaky Role in Election Raid

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is facing mounting scrutiny from both parties over two parallel controversies: a highly classified whistleblower complaint that took eight months to reach Congress, and her unprecedented participation in an FBI raid on a Georgia election center—a domestic law enforcement action that critics say falls far outside the purview of America’s top spy chief.

The dual scandals have raised questions about Gabbard’s understanding of her role, the Trump administration’s approach to oversight, and whether the nation’s intelligence apparatus is being weaponized for domestic political purposes.

Eight Months in Limbo

On February 3, congressional intelligence leaders finally gained access to a whistleblower complaint against Gabbard that had been filed eight months earlier, on May 21, 2025.

The complaint is so highly classified that it has been locked in a safe and sparked months of wrangling over how to share it with Congress, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Intelligence community Inspector General Christopher Fox notified the leaders of the House and Senate intelligence committees in a February 2 letter that he received final approval on January 30 from Gabbard to share the material with a tight circle of lawmakers known as the “Gang of Eight,” according to CBS News.

“Not Credible” But Protected

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rick Crawford, an Arkansas Republican, reviewed the complaint and said he concurred with conclusions reached by both the Biden-era Intelligence Community Inspector General and the current inspector general that the complaint was “not credible,” according to The Hill.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton also reviewed the complaint on February 5 and posted on X that he agreed “with intelligence watchdogs who found the allegations not credible,” according to The Hill.

However, the inspector general’s determination that the allegations were not credible does not eliminate the whistleblower’s legal right to notify Congress, according to CBS News.

DNI Press Secretary Olivia Coleman said on X that “there was absolutely NO wrongdoing by DNI Gabbard” and called the complaint “baseless and politically motivated,” according to Newsweek.

“Director Gabbard has always and will continue to support Whistleblower’s and their right, under the law, to submit complaints to Congress, even if they are completely baseless like this one,” Coleman wrote, according to Newsweek.

Accusations of Stonewalling

The whistleblower’s attorney, Andrew P. Bakaj of WhistleblowerAid.org, accused Gabbard of illegally blocking the complaint from reaching Congress.

“After nearly eight months of taking illegal actions to protect herself, the time has come for Tulsi Gabbard to comply with the law and fully release the disclosure to Congress,” Bakaj said in a statement, according to NBC News.

“The Inspector General’s independence and neutrality is non-existent when the director of national intelligence illegally inserts herself into the process,” Bakaj told NBC News.

Lawmakers on congressional intelligence committees did not learn about the whistleblower’s complaint until November, after Bakaj wrote Gabbard asking why it had not been passed on to Congress as required.

Unprecedented Delay

Former intelligence officials told NBC News that it is highly unusual for a government agency to take several months to transmit a whistleblower complaint to Congress and that spy agencies usually are able to resolve security concerns in days or weeks.

The inspector general is generally required to assess whether a complaint is credible within two weeks of receiving it and share it with lawmakers within another week if it determines it is credible.

“The lengthy delay on sending the complaint to Congress is without known precedent, according to watchdog experts and former intelligence officials,” The Wall Street Journal reported.

The Georgia Election Raid: “Do Not Invite”

While the whistleblower controversy simmered behind closed doors, Gabbard thrust herself into public view on January 28 when she appeared at an FBI raid on the Fulton County Election Hub and Operation Center in Union City, Georgia, near Atlanta.

Photographers captured images of Gabbard speaking on the phone while standing in or near a vehicle loaded with boxes containing 2020 election ballots and records.

An Unprecedented Role for a Spy Chief

Gabbard’s presence at the scene was unprecedented for a Director of National Intelligence, whose job is to oversee the nation’s spy agencies and track threats from foreign adversaries, according to NBC News.

“In her role overseeing the country’s spy agencies, Gabbard is prohibited by law from taking part in domestic law enforcement,” NBC News reported. “Her predecessors took pains to keep their distance from Justice Department cases or partisan politics.”

David Becker, director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research and a former attorney for the Department of Justice, told Democracy Now! that Gabbard “has no statutory authority to be involved in a domestic election investigation.”

Two senior officials with knowledge of the matter told NBC News that Gabbard’s presence in Fulton County was unnecessary and was not requested by the Justice Department.

“It seems to be an attempt to make herself relevant,” one official told NBC News. “It’s so strange.”

MSNBC noted that Gabbard has been left out of important strategy sessions and briefings, apparently having fallen out of favor with Trump. Some White House aides reportedly joked that the abbreviation of her title, DNI, stood for ‘Do Not Invite.’

Trump’s Direct Request

In a February 3 letter to congressional intelligence leaders, Gabbard revealed that her presence at the election center was “requested” by President Trump and that she only observed the execution of the FBI search warrant “for a brief period of time,” according to The Hill.

The New York Times reported, citing three people with knowledge of the meeting, that Trump asked the agents questions, which were mostly fielded by the squad supervisor who developed evidence for the search of the election office.

Gabbard wrote that Trump “did not ask any questions, nor did he or I issue any directives,” according to The Daily Caller.

The Administration’s Defense

A senior administration official told CNN that “Director Gabbard has a pivotal role in election security and protecting the integrity of our elections against interference, including operations targeting voting systems, databases, and election infrastructure.”

“She has and will continue to take action on President Trump’s directive to secure our elections and work with our interagency partners to do so,” the official added, according to CNN and ABC News.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on February 3 that Trump has tapped Gabbard to “oversee the sanctity and the security of our American elections,” according to CNBC.

“This is a coordinated, whole-of-government effort to ensure that our elections, again, are fair and transparent moving forward,” Leavitt said, according to the same source.

Gabbard’s Prior Statements on Election Security

At a Cabinet meeting in April 2025, Gabbard said she had a team focused on election integrity, according to ABC News.

“We have evidence of how these electronic voting systems have been vulnerable to hackers for a very long time and vulnerable to exploitation, to manipulate the results of the votes being cast, which further drives forward your mandate to bring about paper ballots across the country so that voters can have faith in the integrity of our elections,” Gabbard alleged at the meeting without providing details, according to ABC News.

In July 2025, during an appearance on “Fox & Friends,” Gabbard again framed the issue as central to public trust. “When we look at the future of our country as a democratic republic, and the American people’s ability to have faith that when they go and cast a vote at the ballot box, that the will of the people will be heard and represented,” Gabbard said, according to ABC News.

Congressional Democrats Demand Answers

On January 30, Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner and House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Jim Himes sent a letter to Gabbard seeking an explanation for her involvement in the Fulton County election probe, according to ABC News.

On February 3, Warner called on Gabbard to testify in person before the Senate Intelligence Committee about her appearance at the FBI raid, according to CNBC.

Warner accused Gabbard’s office of systematically “dismantling” various guardrails designed to protect elections. “When you put all of this together, it is clear that what happened in Fulton County is not about revisiting the past, it is about shaping the outcome of future elections,” Warner said, according to CNBC.

Warner also sounded alarms about Trump’s recent suggestion that Republicans should “take over” and “nationalize” elections. “That statement alone makes clear that this threat to our election security, the basic premise of our democracy, is forward looking to 2026 into 2028,” he said, according to the same source.

A Pattern of Marginalization, Then Controversy

The controversies come amid reports that Gabbard has been sidelined within the Trump administration despite holding one of the most senior national security positions.

NBC News reported on January 29 that when President Trump watched a live feed of the U.S. military operation that captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, Gabbard was not in the room. Just two days earlier, she had posted photos of herself on a beach in Hawaii at sunset practicing yoga.

“That she appeared to be on vacation in the run-up to such a high-stakes, ultra-sensitive military operation seemed to underscore the extent to which she has been sidelined by the administration,” NBC News reported.

MSNBC noted that Gabbard has been left out of important strategy sessions and briefings, apparently having fallen out of favor with Trump. “Some White House aides reportedly joked that the abbreviation of her title, DNI, stood for ‘Do Not Invite,'” MSNBC reported.

This story was aggregated by AI from several news reports and edited by American Kahani’s News Desk.