Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., said he wants Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee about why she was at an FBI raid last week on an election office near Atlanta.
Warner expressed dismay over Gabbard's acknowledgment that she facilitated a phone call between President Donald Trump and the FBI agents who conducted the raid on an election office in Fulton County.
"Let's be clear: It is inappropriate for a sitting president to personally involve himself in a criminal investigation tied to an election he lost," Warner, vice chair of the committee, told reporters Tuesday.
"When you put all of this together, it is clear that what happened in Fulton County is not about revisiting the past, it is about shaping the outcome of future elections," he added.
"The broad authority to analyze intelligence is not a license to participate in a sham investigation," Warner continued. "And it certainly does not justify facilitating direct contact between the frontline FBI agents doing this investigation, directly to the president of the United States."
On Monday, Gabbard said Trump requested her presence at the raid, saying she acted fully within her legal authority to protect election integrity and national security.
"Contrary to the blatantly false and slanderous accusations being made against me by Members of Congress and their friends in the propaganda media, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence has and will continue to take action under my statutory authorities to secure our nation and ensure the integrity of our elections," Gabbard wrote Monday night in a letter to Warner and House Intelligence Committee ranking member Jim Himes, D-Conn., that she also shared on X.
She said she accompanied FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate and the acting special agent in charge of the field office only briefly and did not participate in the search, which was carried out under a court-approved warrant.
"My presence was requested by the President and executed under my broad statutory authority to coordinate, integrate, and analyze intelligence related to election security," Gabbard wrote, citing her responsibility to oversee counterintelligence, foreign influence threats, and cybersecurity.
Gabbard emphasized that the FBI's intelligence and counterintelligence divisions fall under her authority as director of national intelligence, which oversees 18 intelligence agencies.
She also noted that senior FBI officials in field offices serve as her designated domestic intelligence representatives under a program established more than a decade ago.
Gabbard also defended her decision not to brief Congress in advance, saying it would be irresponsible to share incomplete intelligence assessments.
She warned that electronic voting systems have long faced vulnerabilities that could be exploited by determined actors and said intelligence reviews are necessary before conclusions are shared publicly.
Axios reported that Fulton County officials objected to the search and accused Trump allies of political retaliation.
The Department of Justice, however, has said the search was authorized by a federal court, and Gabbard's office says her actions were reviewed and approved by its own general counsel.
Sam Barron ✉
Sam Barron has almost two decades of experience covering a wide range of topics including politics, crime and business.
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