Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard released documents on Monday that she claimed revealed a “deep state” conspiracy behind President Donald Trump’s first impeachment — the latest in a pattern of behavior that Democratic lawmakers say reveals a director of national intelligence willing to distort facts to serve the president’s grievances.
The documents, which Gabbard said proved that a former inspector general and Democratic lawmakers had coordinated to weaponize the whistleblower process against Trump, fell short of that claim. Their contents do not describe specific new examples of coordination of the whistleblower working “hand in glove” with Democrats.
They do describe information that Republicans say was not shared with Trump’s impeachment defense lawyers, which they argue undermined the whistleblower’s credibility. They included the whistleblower, a CIA officer who was an expert on Ukraine, working closely with President Joe Biden on Ukraine issues, receiving death threats from Trump supporters and being a registered Democrat.
The documents also include positive descriptions of the whistleblower, including a colleague describing them as a “star performer” who was “very detail oriented,” credible and trustworthy, and “deliberate, methodical and very squared away.”
The documents note a supervisor’s frustration that the whistleblower had not given her more notice before filing a complaint. But the supervisor also described the whistleblower as an “excellent employee” and a “credible person” who had “credibility across the intelligence community.”
Gabbard, for her part, framed her release in sweeping terms. “Deep state actors within the Intelligence Community concocted a false narrative that was used by Congress to usurp the will of the American people and impeach the duly-elected President of the United States,” she said in a statement.
She accused the intelligence community’s inspector general at the time, Michael Atkinson, a former career Justice Department lawyer, of incorrectly determining that the complaint regarding Trump’s 2019 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was of “urgent concern” and “appears credible,” and must be reported to Congress.
“Inspector General Atkinson failed to uphold his responsibility to the American people, putting political motivations over the truth,” Gabbard wrote. “And this, along with the politicization of the whistleblower process by a former CIA employee who was working hand in glove with Democrats in Congress, are egregious examples of the deep state playbook on how to weaponize the Intelligence Community.”
Atkinson noted that while his preliminary review “identified some indicia of an arguable political bias on the part of the Complainant in favor of a rival political candidate, such evidence did not change my determination that the complaint relating to the urgent concern ‘appears credible,’ particularly given the other information the ICIG obtained during its preliminary review.”
Atkinson did not respond to a request for comment.
Democrats dismissed Gabbard’s claims as false, calling them the latest example of her trafficking in conspiracy theories to please Trump. Several warned that Gabbard — who has taken a lead role in backing Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen — is laying the groundwork to cast doubt about Democratic victories in the November midterm elections.
“Director Gabbard’s latest claims aren’t about accountability — they’re about rewriting history to serve Donald Trump,” said Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee. “She has shown a willingness to say or do whatever it takes to stay in his good graces.”
Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, said that Atkinson was right to find the whistleblower credible and share their complaint with Congress.
“Everyone can read the transcript of the president’s attempt to extort President Zelenskyy,” Himes said, referring to a call in which Trump pressured the Ukrainian leader to investigate his then-political rival, Joe Biden. “That was an impeachable offense, and no amount of dust-kicking and sycophancy can obscure it.”
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David Rohde
David Rohde is the senior national security reporter for MS NOW. Previously he was the senior executive editor for national security and law for NBC News.
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