President Trump’s choice of Bill Pulte as acting director of national intelligence to replace Tulsi Gabbard is raising concerns among Democrats and Republicans.
Pulte does not have a national security background and has used his position as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency to go after Trump’s perceived enemies, including New York Attorney General Letitia James.
“Well, it’s really incomprehensible. It’s almost as though April Fool’s Day has come again,” John Bolton told Here & Now’s Robin Young. “I think the lack of qualifications speaks for itself.”
Bolton served as national security adviser during Trump’s first term and as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations during George W. Bush’s administration.
He has since become one of Trump’s biggest critics.
2 questions with John Bolton
Are you worried that he will do as he has done in the housing role and use the intelligence agency somehow for retribution?
“Well, I think he may try to. [Outgoing Director of National Intelligence] Tulsi Gabbard went way over the line when she went down to Georgia to assist or participate in an FBI effort to get ballots from the 2020 election. I think that whole effort is misguided and beyond the president’s authority, but it’s particularly inappropriate for the director of national intelligence to be involved. But with Gabbard having set that precedent, I’m sure that’s on Pulte’s mind.
“But I think there’s actually a threat in the national security space because I think many of our foreign partners who share intelligence with us and with whom we share intelligence, were already rocked pretty badly by Tulsi Gabbard’s appointment to the position. And to see Pulte now nominated to it, I think may shake them even further. So I’d have to say I’m worried that we may see trusted partners, and we built up these relationships over decades, saying whether, saying it directly to us or just acting through, not providing information that we’re going to we’re going to lose information that could be very important to us.”
What kind of access do you think he will have to sensitive intelligence information now?
“Well, in theory, he could have access to all of it because this is the top position in the intelligence community. And I think that also explains why already just within 24 hours of the announcement, you’ve already had a number of Republicans in the Senate in particular, criticizing the nomination or saying in a somewhat subtle way they don’t think it ought to go anywhere. But using the acting route, Trump really doesn’t need approval from the Senate. But I think it’s something that has a lot of people disturbed on a bipartisan basis because of the lack of qualifications and the risk that fealty to Trump is the real qualification that he was seeking.”
This interview was edited for clarity.
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