An ODNI official, granted anonymity to share details of internal office dynamics, said Gabbard herself was not opposed to seeing the office she headed vanish. “Since day one, DNI Gabbard said she’d be willing to be the last Director of National Intelligence if that’s what was needed,” the official said.
A spokesperson for House Intelligence Chair Rick Crawford (R-Ark.), while calling ODNI “bloated,” defended the office as “the only IC entity rooting out weaponization, holding wrongdoers accountable, and increasing transparency for the American people.”
Democrats are broadly defending ODNI despite their gripes. House Intelligence Committee ranking member Jim Himes (D-Conn.) told POLITICO ODNI was “probably overly large” but that Pulte’s “catastrophic” appointment shouldn’t spur a knee-jerk shuttering of the agency.
He highlighted the National Counterterrrorism Center — which is housed at the ODNI — as an example of what not to cut. “We are talking about the safety of the American people,” he said.
Senate Intelligence Vice Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.) similarly said questions about whether ODNI had “grown too large” were legitimate but added, “before Congress starts dismantling structures that were created to address failures identified after 9/11, we ought to have a serious, fact-based discussion about what problem we’re trying to solve.”
Other Senate Intel Dems offered a forceful defense of the agency. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) argued Trump appointed Pulte “to fire professional staff who disagree with his mission of politicizing intelligence and weaponizing surveillance against his critics.” Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) said “ODNI is vital to keeping our country safe from threats at home and abroad.” A spokesperson for Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) said eliminating ODNI was “unserious.”
The White House and CIA didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Larry Pfeiffer, who was among the first employees of ODNI, told POLITICO that the agency faced headwinds from its inception. He said some CIA staff saw it as taking away from their authority, and “have never given up that fight even 20 years later.”
