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With Matt Gaetz out of the picture, the left and the GOP establishment have turned their guns on Tulsi Gabbard as their next target. President-elect Donald Trump selected Gabbard to be his Director of National Intelligence, and while one has a right to question whether there is anything in her background or experience that qualifies her to lead America’s Intelligence Community, the direction the opposition is going is both unprincipled and unconstitutional.

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For a time, the Biden-Harris administration placed Gabbard on a “Quiet Skies” watch list. While not a terrorism watch list per se, Quiet Skies did subject Americans to enhanced screening and scrutiny based on her “overseas travel and foreign connections.” 

Gabbard was an officer in the US Army Reserve at the time. We don’t know what “briefly” means, and all of this begs the question of how the federal government was aware of her “overseas travel and foreign connections.” This attack is reminiscent of the way that the Obama Administration placed Carter Page under illegal FISA monitoring, leaked the fact that the surveillance existed, and then used the illegal spying as evidence that Page was a foreign agent. It is also a political “heckler’s veto.” It gives the bureaucracy the power to eliminate potential threats by placing them on some sort of “watch list” controlled by bureaucrats and using that action as a disqualification for office.

The second line of attack against Gabbard is that she is “compromised.”

Here is Illinois Democrat Senator Tammy Duckworth pushing the slander that Gabbard is a foreign agent of some sort.

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DUCKWORTH: Well, I think she’s compromised. I think by going to Syria and basically backing this brutal dictator there — I mean, Russian-controlled media called her a Russian asset. So I do think that we have a real deep concern whether or not she’s a compromised person.

And, frankly, the U.S. Intelligence Committee — I’m sorry — the U.S. intelligence community has identified her as having troubling relationships with America’s foes. And so my worry is that she couldn’t pass a background check.

BASH: So you are a Democrat. You are in the minority now in the United States Senate. If she can find the votes among Republicans, likely, to get confirmed, it sounds like that would worry you to have her in that job.

DUCKWORTH: Very much so. She has no intelligence background whatsoever.

When she was in Iraq, she was a medical records clerk E4, below the rank of sergeant. Her second deployment was actually to Kuwait, Kuwaiti naval base, where she only spent three months training the Kuwaiti military. So — and I don’t know of any intelligence work that she has done.

So she is, in terms of the intelligence community, very unqualified. Plus, she is potentially compromised and could be and has — there are questions about whether or not she is now a Russian asset.

BASH: Do you believe that she could be a Russian asset?

DUCKWORTH: I think that she is someone who is wholly backing and supportive of Putin. And I worry that she will not have America’s best interests at heart.

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This is the same allegation on Anderson Cooper 360. The critical part starts at 0:38. 

Sadly, Nikki Haley couldn’t resist the effort to get in a couple of licks. Go to 1:31 for the relevant segment.

While I might agree that Gabbard seems to have adopted Howard Zinn’s view that America’s foreign policy is the cause of all evil in the world, that doesn’t make her compromised. In my view, it makes her a terrible choice for any national security position, but that is a different story.

Finally, there is the unabashedly unconstitutional religious test applied to Gabbard. She is a Hindu sect, and that is being used as a line of attack.

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This same attack has been deployed against orthodox believers, no matter their religion. Recall that Catholic nominees are regularly grilled over their religion if they are to the right of the adulterous, blasphemous Joe Biden.

RELATED:

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Ben Sasse’s Anti-Bigotry Resolution Is a Sign of the Danger Christians Are In – RedState

SHOTS FIRED! Democrat Congresswoman Blasts Democrat Senators for Their Religious Bigotry – RedState

“Chilling”: Notre Dame President Slams Dianne Feinstein for Her Religious Bigotry – RedState

Ben Sasse Mocks the Anti-Catholic Bigotry of Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee – RedState

The Constitutional prohibition on religious tests for public office applies no matter your feelings about the religion. 

Tulsi Gabbard’s confirmation hearing should focus on whether she has the intellect and the character to effectively manage the US Intelligence Community. Slurs about her being compromised or her religion are off-limits. The fact that the Biden-Harris administration put her on a “watch list” is more of an indictment of the process that did that than any reflection on her. Yes, she does need to answer some hard questions about her vocal defense of Iran, meeting with Syria’s Assad, and some other statements, but none of that justifies calling her compromised.

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