(Reuters) – U.S. national intelligence firm Tulsi Gabbard promises to crack down on people in the intelligence community who leak information.
Gabbard, who runs 18 spy agencies, said she will “actively pursue recent leakers” to keep them accountable for unauthorized disclosures.
“Political-motivated leaks undermine our national security and the trust of the American people and will not be tolerated,” Gabbard wrote in an article on X on Friday.
Gabbard lists the latest examples she says, including information leaks about Israel-Iran, U.S.-Russia relations, and the national counterintelligence and security centers, including the Huffington Post, The Washington Post, The Washington Post, NBC News and Records.
“Any unauthorized confidential information is a violation of the law and will be deemed to be like this,” Gabbard said.
During his first term, Republican President Donald Trump was angry at the news media leak, and his administration pursued journalists and their sources within the federal government.
His administration secretly secured data from members of Congress, their staff, journalists and former White House lawyers as part of an investigation into the leak of confidential information — a move prompted former Attorney General Merrick Garland to strengthen Justice Department policy in 2021 to gain records from lawmakers.
The Garland Department of Justice also changed its policy to widely ban prosecutors from emailing journalists’ phone calls and email records after outcry over actions in Trump-era leak investigations.
The Justice Department’s internal regulator found in 2024 that the decision by prosecutors to send records and email records to members of Congress and their staff during Trump’s first term could have a chilling impact on congressional oversight.
(Reported by Ryan Patrick Jones of Toronto; Edited by Alistair Bell)
