00:00We have four more weeks with Director Gabbard as the DNI, and I look forward to implementing last year's Intelligence
00:06Authorization Act with her to implement wide-ranging reforms that will shrink the DNI and take it back to its
00:12original intent to provide a mere coordinator or process role for the intelligence community.
00:19I have no observations on the matter.
00:23Chair of the Intelligence Committee, Republican Senator Tom Cotton, saying he has no observations on the matter.
00:28The matter was President Trump's appointment yesterday of Bill Pulte's acting Director of National Intelligence.
00:34Pulte, who leads the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has no known background in intelligence, defense, or national security.
00:42But he is a Trump loyalist who has pushed for mortgage fraud cases against public officials that Trump views as
00:49political enemies.
00:49They include New York Attorney General Letitia James, Democratic Senator Adam Schiff of California, as well as Federal Reserve Governor
00:58Lisa Cook.
00:59Let's bring in MSNOW Senior National Security Reporter David Rode.
01:03David, good morning.
01:04Your latest reporting focuses on new warnings from Democrats about Pulte.
01:09Senator Mark Warner of Virginia told you this.
01:14What I've been concerned about for ages is, will the Trump administration or people inside it try to manipulate our
01:21elections this fall?
01:22We already saw that with the prior DNI in terms of Tulsi Gabbard grabbing these ballot boxes in Fulton County.
01:29If I was concerned about Tulsi Gabbard, Bill Pulte raises those concerns tenfold.
01:35And Democratic Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts said he shared Warner's concerns, telling you this is, without question,
01:43a further continuation of the Trump administration goals to put yes-men lackeys in place who will further the goal
01:51that was begun
01:52to compromise the elections in Atlanta, in Georgia, in states around the country.
01:58So, David, I'll simply add to this that, by law, DNI is supposed to have extensive experience in this field.
02:06Pulte, of course, does not.
02:08What are some of the other concerns you're hearing?
02:11First of all, the lack of experience is important.
02:14We're at war right now with Iran, and Pulte's job is to coordinate all the national intelligence.
02:19There's also no director of the National Counterterrorism Center.
02:23Joe Kent, who held that job, resigned over the war several weeks ago.
02:26But the real issue with Pulte is his loyalty to the president.
02:30He's 38 years old.
02:32He has never worked in intelligence.
02:35He's worked his family, owned a large construction company.
02:38He worked for that and worked in private equity.
02:41And then the way he used his time running this federal agency that's involved in banking issues and mortgages
02:47was to feed information to help investigations of the president's rivals.
02:52And I don't want to exaggerate or I don't want to alarm people, but I think it's important to talk
02:58about worst case scenarios here.
03:00And Tulsi Gabbard, as was mentioned in the quote, went to Fulton County, Georgia, seized election records that she hoped
03:07would bolster President Trump's claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
03:10And there's a lot of fears that Pulte will do the same thing.
03:14And there's some scenarios which I can talk about about them literally trying to stop the voting in certain places
03:20on Election Day in November.
03:22So, Rufus, you know, that is Pulte's qualification areas.
03:28The Trump loyalist is willing to be a hatchet man, in the words of a Democrat who I spoke to
03:32yesterday.
03:33And it's very clear that the Trump retribution campaign, though politically unpopular with voters, is not only going to continue,
03:40it may accelerate.
03:41Yeah.
03:41And it's clearly a priority of the president's.
03:44I mean, this appointment just speaks to exactly that.
03:46Look, these are DNI, I mean, this is an apolitical job, Jonathan.
03:51It has to be for our country to be what its promise is.
03:55And I think that it is extraordinary to see someone as woefully.
