Tul­si Gab­bard Secures Com­mit­tee Vote, Advances To Sen­ate Floor

Tulsi Gabbard Secures Committee Vote, Advances To Senate Floor

The Sen­ate Intel­li­gence Com­mit­tee vot­ed in favor of advanc­ing Tul­si Gabbard’s nom­i­na­tion for Direc­tor of Nation­al Intel­li­gence (DNI) Tues­day.

The vote was expect­ed to be along par­ty lines, with nine Repub­li­cans sup­port­ing and eight Democ­rats oppos­ing her nom­i­na­tion. The com­mit­tee vot­ed on her nom­i­na­tion in a “closed ses­sion,” a com­mit­tee aide told CBS News.

She will now head to the floor for a Sen­ate-wide vote, where can only afford to lose three Repub­li­cans.

Gabbard’s con­fir­ma­tion hear­ing was Fri­day, and she was ques­tioned by sen­a­tors about her views on for­eign pol­i­cy, Sec­tion 702 of the For­eign Intel­li­gence Sur­veil­lance (FISA) Act and Nation­al Secu­ri­ty Agency (NSA) whistle­blow­er Edward Snow­den. (RELATED: Tul­si Gab­bard Secures Shock Endorse­ment From Susan Collins, Dras­ti­cal­ly Increas­ing Chance Of Con­fir­ma­tion)

While in Con­gress, Gab­bard intro­duced leg­is­la­tion to lim­it gov­ern­ment sur­veil­lance, includ­ing FISA. She has also expressed sup­port for par­don­ing Snow­den, which proved con­tentious dur­ing the hear­ing.

Dur­ing the hear­ing, Gab­bard attacked the weaponiza­tion of the intel­li­gence com­mu­ni­ty and refused the demands of some sen­a­tors to call Snow­den a trai­tor.

How­ev­er, Repub­li­can sen­a­tors con­cerned about Gabbard’s views con­firmed they would sup­port her in the hours lead­ing up to the vote.

Indi­ana Sen. Todd Young stat­ed Tues­day morn­ing he would sup­port Gabbard’s nom­i­na­tion. He tweet­ed a let­ter Gab­bard sent him out­lin­ing spe­cif­ic com­mit­ments she made to the com­mit­tee.

Gab­bard com­mit­ted to not rec­om­mend­ing a par­don for Snow­den, and she agreed to col­lab­o­rate with the com­mit­tee on reau­tho­riz­ing Sec­tion 702 of FISA.

“As I said to Sen­a­tor Collins dur­ing the hear­ing, I com­mit to not mak­ing any rec­om­men­da­tion in a per­son­al or pro­fes­sion­al capac­i­ty regard­ing the legal stand­ing of Edward Snow­den to the Pres­i­dent of the Unit­ed States or the Attor­ney Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed States,” Gab­bard wrote.

Maine Sen. Susan Collins announced yes­ter­day she would vote to con­firm Gab­bard, cit­ing their shared agree­ment on reduc­ing bureau­cra­cy in the Office of the Direc­tor of Nation­al Intel­li­gence (ODNI).

She also said Gab­bard suf­fi­cient­ly addressed her con­cerns regard­ing Snow­den. (RELATED: ‘I Refused To Be Their Pup­pet’: Tul­si Slams Gov­ern­ment Weaponiza­tion, Responds To Crit­i­cism At Hear­ing)

“In response to my ques­tions dur­ing our dis­cus­sion in my office and at the open hear­ing, as well as through her expla­na­tion at the closed hear­ing before the Sen­ate Intel­li­gence Com­mit­tee, Ms. Gab­bard addressed my con­cerns regard­ing her views on Edward Snow­den,” Collins said.

Okla­homa Sen. James Lank­ford pre­vi­ous­ly stat­ed he would vote for Gab­bard, but seemed to waver on his sup­port dur­ing the hear­ing. He recom­mit­ted to vot­ing for her yes­ter­day, CNN report­ed.

Some Repub­li­can sen­a­tors who are not on the com­mit­tee were also con­sid­ered poten­tial swing votes, includ­ing South Car­oli­na Sen. Lind­sey Gra­ham. He said on Sun­day, how­ev­er, that he would vote in favor of Gabbard’s nom­i­na­tion.

“She demon­strat­ed that she under­stands the impor­tance of tools we need to pro­tect our nation­al secu­ri­ty,” Gra­ham wrote online Sun­day. (RELATED: Tul­si Gab­bard Was Vic­tim­ized By The Intel Com­mu­ni­ty — Now She’s Try­ing To Over­see It)

Two oth­er Repub­li­cans have not explic­it­ly said they will vote for Gab­bard  — Ken­tucky Sen. Mitch McConnell and Alas­ka Sen. Lisa Murkows­ki. Both vot­ed against Pete Hegseth for Sec­re­tary of Defense, and they also vot­ed to con­firm Biden’s DNI, Avril Haines.

Murkows­ki had a meet­ing with Gab­bard in Decem­ber, but it is unclear if she will vote in favor of her nom­i­na­tion.