Both Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said they would vote to confirm Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence.
On Monday, Murkowski, Cassidy, and the other Republican senators who voted chose to move forward with the confirmation process by supporting cloture. The Democratic senators who voted, on the other hand, were against cloture.
“I will vote to confirm Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence,” Murkowski declared in a post on X.
“While I continue to have concerns about certain positions she has previously taken, I appreciate her commitment to rein in the outsized scope of the agency, while still enabling the ODNI to continue its essential function in upholding national security. As she brings independent thinking and necessary oversight to her new role, I am counting on her to ensure the safety and civil liberties of American citizens remain rigorously protected,” Murkowski added.
“President Trump chose Tulsi Gabbard to be his point person on foreign intelligence,” Cassidy said in a statement. “I will trust President Trump on this decision and vote for her confirmation.”
Gabbard was in Congress from the beginning of 2013 to the beginning of 2021. In 2022, she said she was leaving the Democratic Party.
She backed Trump for president in 2024 and said she was joining the Republican Party last year.
At the end of last week, John Thune, the majority leader in the Senate, put five more Trump nominees on the table for review. But Senate Republicans would have to agree on a time frame with Democrats if they want to confirm all of those nominees this week.
Senate Republicans are putting Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at the top of their list for confirmation votes. They are two of Trump’s more controversial Cabinet picks, Punchbowl News reported.
People used to think Gabbard was the most vulnerable nominee, but last week she was able to get past Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Todd Young (R-Ind.) and move on to the next step in the process.
Gabbard’s vote is either late Tuesday night or early Wednesday morning because the process has to wait 30 hours after cloture. We don’t think Democrats will give any of that time back.
The Senate will then vote on whether to confirm Kennedy to lead the Health and Human Services Department.
Kennedy got Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), one of his biggest critics, to support him in committee, and he looks like he will be confirmed. McConnell is not likely to vote for Kennedy because he had polio as a child. There won’t be four “no” votes from the GOP on Kennedy, though, since Cassidy will be a “yes.”
Thune brought up three more nominations on Thursday. Brooke Rollins was put forward to be secretary of agriculture, Howard Lutnick was put forward to be secretary of commerce, and former Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) was put forward to be small business administrator. We still don’t know if these nominees will get votes of approval this week.
This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee will also have some big confirmation news.
The panel will vote on Thursday on Kash Patel’s request to lead the FBI.
Democrats were able to put off the nomination for a week because of rules in the Judiciary Committee.
“One by one, Republicans have acquiesced to Trump’s picks, even those whose personal history, lack of experience and unorthodox views would have once made them hardly imaginable for a Cabinet. It’s a striking demonstration of how GOP lawmakers are standing by as Trump, in a show of force, disrupts the federal government and installs loyalists to lead key departments. Republican leaders in the Senate, eager to show Trump their worth, have chalked up confirmations at a rapid clip,” the Associated Press reported.
