CONFIRMATION BIAS — Former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) shocked Washington in 2017 with her mysterious meeting with then-Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Since the start of the war in Ukraine, she’s arguably been sympathetic to various planks of Russia’s arguments for invasion. She’s President Donald Trump’s nominee for director of national intelligence, but has limited experience as a member of the intelligence community.
Any one of those resume bullet points might be enough to sink her precariously perched nomination, but in her confirmation hearing today it was Edward Snowden that dominated the discussion. Judging from the line of questioning from senators in both parties, it’s that chapter of Gabbard’s history — not the inexperience or the unorthodox views — that might be too much to overcome.
Snowden, the former NSA intelligence contractor and whistleblower who leaked classified information and fled the country over a decade ago, continues to face criminal charges in the United States for allegedly violating the Espionage Act. Yet a sliver of U.S. politicians and commentators — in particular those on the far poles of each party who have been overtly and consistently suspicious of the U.S. surveillance state — have come to Snowden’s defense.
Gabbard is one of them. In September 2020, as a member of Congress, she co-sponsored a House resolution with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) suggesting the federal government “should drop all charges against Edward Snowden.”
It’s a view that’s not widely held, particularly in Congress. Snowden’s disclosures — including that the NSA was monitoring foreign leaders allied with the U.S. — shook the American security apparatus to its core and prompted significant global distrust among U.S. allies.
Senators were quick to zero in on the Snowden issue with pointed questions — even the Republicans who have treated nearly all of Trump’s nominees thus far with kid gloves.
While Gabbard agreed that Snowden “broke the law,” she repeatedly and glaringly sidestepped questions about whether she considered him a traitor to the United States.
The question now is whether the committee’s skeptical Republicans can live with that (the Democrats will almost certainly vote against her en masse) and advance Gabbard’s nomination to the Senate floor. The tone and tenor of the questions Gabbard faced suggested they could not, but she’s already got the support of one of the most important voices in Congress on the matter — Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, a sharp Snowden critic.
And the Snowden fault lines have shifted in recent years. As MAGA-fueled suspicion and animosity toward the so-called Deep State has increasingly taken root within the GOP, a schism has opened on the right about whether Snowden is a traitor or a hero.
Trump himself has evolved in his thinking. After calling Snowden a “traitor” and a “spy who should be executed” prior to his election as president, Trump said in 2020 that he would consider a pardon for him. After he left office, Trump said, “I decided to let that one ride, let the courts work it out … I was very close to going the other way.”
Given the intense MAGA pressure on Republican senators to confirm Trump’s nominees, regardless of their misgivings, the ultimate question for many senators likely won’t be whether Gabbard is fit for the job, or whether Snowden is a traitor. Rather, it’s whether they feel strongly enough about either issue to risk getting a primary election challenge.
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— Congress’ airport is now home to America’s worst aviation disaster in decades: Authorities said today they believe there were no survivors in the crash between a regional American Airlines jet and a U.S. Army helicopter late Wednesday at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. Twenty-seven bodies had been recovered from the downed plane, a Bombardier CRJ700 operated by PSA Airlines, and one had been recovered from the helicopter, a Sikorsky H-60, said D.C. Fire and EMS Chief John Donnelly during a news conference at the airport early today. A total of 60 passengers and four crew members were aboard the plane, which departed from Wichita, Kansas, according to American Airlines, and three soldiers were on the helicopter.
— Rubio says Trump is serious about buying Greenland: Secretary of State Marco Rubio doubled down on President Donald Trump’s desire to buy Greenland, saying it would be vital to U.S. interests. “This is not a joke,” Rubio said on the “The Megyn Kelly Show” on SiriusXM today, one of his first media appearances since being sworn in. During the interview, Rubio downplayed Trump’s previous remarks about not ruling out using military force against Denmark, a NATO ally, to acquire Greenland — but he didn’t outright dismiss the possibility.
— Trump weighs rescinding controversial Manhattan toll: President Donald Trump is considering withdrawing federal support for a controversial New York City toll program — a move that could halt it, according to three people familiar with the discussions. The Department of Transportation conversations, first reported by The New York Times, could short circuit a $9 toll program that took effect Jan. 5 and has stoked deep passions from supporters and foes alike. Trump has railed against the “congestion pricing” program in his native New York City and vowed during his campaign last year to kill it.
INCHING CLOSER — Russ Vought is one step closer to returning to the helm of the Office of Management and Budget, which threw Washington into confusion this week with sweeping orders to freeze federal grants and loans.
President Donald Trump’s pick to run the powerful White House budget office will head to the Senate floor soon for a confirmation vote, after the Senate Budget Committee advanced Vought’s nomination along party lines today.
The panel voted 11-0 to move Vought’s nomination to the floor — a vote made up entirely of Republicans, as Democrats less than an hour before the scheduled markup announced they would be boycotting the meeting. Instead of attending the markup, Democratic senators gathered at a press conference elsewhere in the Capitol to deride Vought as “dangerously unfit.”
DUD OF A HEARING — President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the FBI appeared to consolidate Republican support today, swatting aside repeated attacks by Democrats who struggled to articulate a cohesive case against a nominee who has sent shockwaves through law enforcement circles.
There was building anticipation for Kash Patel’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee after Democrats used their time a few weeks ago to question attorney general nominee Pam Bondi not about her own record but Patel’s. Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) opened Patel’s hearing by acknowledging the day’s events could be “controversial.”
A longtime Trump loyalist, Patel has a lengthy record of comments suggesting he would use his office to go after Trump’s political adversaries and root out the “Deep State.” Yet today, Democrats chose to frequently highlight his collaboration with a group of violent Jan. 6 offenders in recording a rendition of the National Anthem. Efforts to create viral moments by casting Patel as an extremist fell flat and did little to steer Republican questions in a more provocative direction.
BURGUM CONFIRMED — The Senate easily confirmed Doug Burgum as secretary of the Interior Department today, a job that positions him to act on President Donald Trump’s energy strategy.
The 79-18 vote makes the wealthy former North Dakota governor the official in charge of Trump’s “drill, baby, drill” plans as the Interior oversees energy production on public land and in federal waters. Burgum promised in his nomination hearing to open more areas up for production of oil, natural gas and coal and warned that too much emphasis had been placed on renewable energy projects during the Biden administration, a stance that worried some Democrats.
NORWEGIAN CRACK-UP — The Norwegian government collapsed today after the Euroskeptic Centre Party left the two-party coalition after weeks of brawling over the adoption of three EU energy directives, local media reported. Their exit leaves Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre’s center-left Labour Party to govern on its own for the first time in 25 years.
Norway, while not part of the EU, has to adopt the bloc’s laws as a member of the European Economic Area (EEA). The agrarian Centre Party is strongly against the EEA agreement, which gives Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein access to the EU’s internal market.
NO CAN DO — Panama President José Raúl Mulino has a message for Secretary of State Marco Rubio ahead of his impending diplomatic visit: The Panama Canal is not up for discussion.
“It’s impossible,” Munilo said in Spanish at a press conference in Panama City today. “I cannot negotiate, and much less open a process of negotiation, over the canal. That’s sealed. The canal belongs to Panama.”
VICTORY DECLARED — The European Central Bank cut its key interest rates by a quarter-point, as greater confidence that inflation is beaten gives it more space to support an economy threatened by a growing array of risks.
The move takes the Bank’s key deposit rate down to 2.75 percent, from a record high of 4 percent last year, and President Christine Lagarde indicated the bank expects further cuts will help to revive growth in a eurozone economy that stagnated at the end of last year, its two largest economies — Germany and France — weighed on by political instability.
For the immediate future, however, it expects the economy to stay weak, not least because its past interest rate hikes in 2022 and 2023 continue to act as a drag: companies and home-owners who took out long-term loans in the days when interest rates were close to zero are still having to refinance those loans at higher levels, forcing them to cut back on other outgoings.
DAMN FINE COFFEE — The fictional town in David Lynch’s “Twin Peaks” is actually made up of three real-life towns in Washington state — North Bend, Snoqualmie and Fall City. And when the famous director died on January 15, Katherine Cusumano decided to take a trip to the towns the next day to see what she might find there. There, she found a community of Lynch fans — both there to pay homage and many who had settled there well prior to his death. The region felt imbued with his characteristic style, and maybe it had helped to inspire some of it as well. Cusumano writes about the trip to diners and memorials and the people she met there for Longreads.
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