Trump Names Pulte as Acting Director of National Intelligence

​Trump 'obviously spiraling' after 'something shifted' in his presidency: ex-official

President Donald Trump has spent multiple nights this week “posting angry screeds” on social media, and while not uncommon for the commander-in-chief, its increased frequency set off alarm bells for one former Trump administration official and security expert.“I want to talk about a SINGLE WEEK. This past week,” wrote former Homeland Security senior official Miles Taylor in an analysis published on his Substack Tuesday. “If y’all didn’t sense it, something shifted these past few days, and you can measure it by the headlines.”On Sunday, Trump attacked several of his political adversaries on social media in a late-night posting spree. He launched similar attacks on social media again the next night. And the reason, Taylor argued, was the president’s unprecedented wave of setbacks he encountered over the previous seven days, setbacks that have sent the president “spiraling.”“Six different fronts in the anti-corruption fight in one week,” Taylor wrote.“A slush fund paused… a president’s name ordered off a national landmark… a lifeline thrown to purged FBI agents… a thousand voices on the record against a Trump gag order… a federal agent in handcuffs for Trump’s unconstitutional crackdown… and a detention camp on the brink of closure.”Trump has taken a series of unprecedented “losses” in recent days, and from his “own friends and allies.” With the primary election season largely finished – and the threat of facing a Trump-backed challenger mostly gone – GOP lawmakers are “suddenly finding it advantageous to oppose” the president, Punchbowl News reported Tuesday.“This is why Trump is staying up late [at] night and having social-media meltdowns. He sees what’s happening, and he can’t believe that an all-powerful, would-be king is being thwarted like this,” Taylor wrote. “It’s possible that many of Trump’s henchmen don’t see it yet, as they’re incentivized to give the boss ‘good news.’ So they’ll pretend the tide is still with them. But on this Tuesday morning, I can confidently say: ‘It isn’t.’ And if they keep looking the other way, sooner or later they’re going to be washed out to sea.”

JD Vance's wife breaks with Trump over president's assault on Supreme Court

Second lady Usha Vance was speaking out this week about how Supreme Court justices deserve "respect" as President Donald Trump has continued lashing out at the high court.In an interview with ABC on Monday night, Vance told anchor Linsey Davis her thoughts about the Supreme Court justices amid the onslaught of Trump assaults, "sparking concerns about a potential constitutional crisis," The Daily Beast reported.Vance, who is married to Vice President JD Vance, previously clerked for Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John Roberts on the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, according to The Beast."I have a lot of respect for the justices," Vance said. "I think that they have a hard and challenging job being in the public eye, just like a lot of other people in Congress, in the media, in the executive branch. So I do want people to treat them with respect.""I think that there has been a lot of personalization of feelings towards judges and the courts across the country that probably didn’t exist, you know, 150 years ago when they were less in the public eye," Vance said.And although she did not say his name, she appeared to allude to Trump's berating of the justices."So I’m hopeful that people will continue to treat them with a sense of humanity and, you know, without the kind of anger that’s led to some attacks on judges," Vance said.Roberts has signaled his concerns about Trump's personal attacks on justices, including the president's frustration with the high court after it struck down his tariff policy in February. At the time, Trump called the justices "disloyal," "unpatriotic," and "fools," The Beast reported.Trump has specifically targeted Justices Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett with his outrage. He appointed both conservative justices and has expressed frustration that they have gone against his wishes in major court decisions, according to The Beast.

'One of the worst': Trump faces backlash from conservatives after naming 'nut' as DNI

Donald Trump's decision to hand the nation's intelligence apparatus to his housing regulator landed with a thud Tuesday — including among members of his own party.Conservative commentator Erick Erickson, founder of RedState, didn't mince words about the pick. "Bill Pulte is one of the worst members of the President's team and has convinced Trump to do more stupid stuff than anyone else in the past year," Erickson wrote on X.That sentiment has been building on Capitol Hill for months. "I think he's a nut," one House Republican told Politico last September. "The guy's just a little too big for his britches," added a second GOP lawmaker on the House Financial Services Committee.Trump announced Tuesday on Truth Social that William J. Pulte — director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency and chairman of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — would serve as acting Director of National Intelligence, replacing Tulsi Gabbard, who resigned last month after her husband was diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer. Pulte will keep all three roles simultaneously.The 38-year-old grandson of homebuilding magnate William J. Pulte has no prior intelligence or national security experience. Since taking over the FHFA in 2025, he has sent criminal referrals to the Justice Department alleging mortgage fraud against New York Attorney General Letitia James, Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA), Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, and Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) — all Trump political foes. The Government Accountability Office opened an investigation into whether he abused his authority in doing so.Reactions beyond the right were withering. "[Pulte] has been at the forefront of using his government position to investigate the president's political enemies," Jewish Insider reporter Jacob Rubashkin wrote on X. "Now he'll head up the nation's intelligence apparatus."Stan Soloway, a former deputy undersecretary of defense, put it plainly: "Does Trump know that building a strong intel infrastructure is not about buildings?"Punchbowl News founder Jake Sherman noted the obvious: Pulte "has never served in an intelligence role." Politico congressional reporter Kyle Cheney called the dual-hatting arrangement perhaps "the weirdest part" — treating the DNI job as part-time.

Trump appoints housing official as acting director of national intelligence

Bill Pulte has shown a willingness to go after the president's perceived enemies.

'Serious concern': Ex-DOJ attorneys sense troubling new direction for Trump crackdown

The Trump administration is pushing deep into new territory in its immigration crackdown, moving beyond deportations to target the citizenship of naturalized Americans in a campaign that legal experts warn could ultimately be weaponized against political opponents.The Justice Department has filed more denaturalization cases in the last 16 months than were filed across all four years of the Biden administration, according to federal data, and attorneys general offices across the country have been tasked with identifying hundreds of additional targets, reported NPR. Department leaders pressuring lawyers to generate cases quickly — sometimes by scanning news stories and social media posts – and while the cases filed so far largely involve serious criminal conduct like drug trafficking, child sexual abuse, terrorism-related activity and war crimes, legal scholars say the infrastructure being built around this effort is far more alarming than any individual case."Once it becomes easy to take somebody's citizenship away — it becomes easy to take anybody's citizenship away," warned Cassandra Robertson, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University who has studied denaturalization.What makes the program particularly troubling to civil liberties advocates is how little protection defendants have. In civil denaturalization proceedings, Americans are not entitled to appointed counsel if they cannot afford it. There is no statute of limitations, meaning the government can reach back decades for evidence, and several cases reviewed by NPR were resolved with little or no court appearance by the defendant.The administration has also signaled the program could expand beyond criminals. Trump and administration officials have publicly threatened the citizenship of political figures including New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar — comments Robertson calls evidence of a real risk of "political retribution."A former DOJ attorney who spent nearly a decade in the office that handles these cases said the mandate under Trump has shifted dramatically. Where lawyers once had discretion to pursue only strong cases, they are now directed to go after anyone potentially eligible — including those with minor paperwork errors or immaterial discrepancies."The retaliatory nature of this administration and using the law in any type of legal maneuvering to go after its enemies — that is a serious concern of mine," the former DOJ attorney said, speaking anonymously for fear of government retaliation.Legal experts note that federal judges — not administration-controlled immigration courts — still oversee these cases, providing some check on potential abuse, but with hundreds of cases now in the pipeline, that guardrail may soon face its first serious test.

Trump reveals his pick to replace embattled Tulsi Gabbard as intel chief

Donald Trump has announced who will replace Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard following her planned resignation.

'Remarkable moment' flagged as Trump appoints official already 'frustrating' insiders

Donald Trump’s decision to appoint Bill Pulte, a businessman currently serving as the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHA), to replace departing DNI director Tulsi Gabbard set off a wave of surprise and consternation on MS NOW Tuesday morning.On Truth Social , Trump made the announcement that Pulte would serve as acting director despite having zero experience in intelligence gathering and analysis, having spent his life working in his family's home construction business.MS NOW’s Jonathan Lemire read the breaking news, which led his colleague Eugene Daniels to point out that Pulte's only seeming ally in the White House is the president himself.Pulte has been involved in making wild accusations of mortgage fraud aimed at some of Donald Trump enemies that have gone nowhere when the Department of Justice later investigated.According to Daniels, because of that, the appointment may not sit well within the White House.“This would seem to be a an escalation in Trump's efforts to relitigate 2020,” Lemire suggested. “Those investigations, which Gabbard was already doing, but also potentially trying to build more acts of retribution against folks.”"It's all loyalty, right?” Daniels replied. “Because Bill Pulte, who is a businessman, does not have experience in foreign policy in the way that you would probably want the DNI to actually have. Their job is to be the go-between all of the intel agencies and typically give the presentation to the president about what the intel agencies are saying or doing. He is also someone who folks in the white house have been a little bit frustrated with, not Donald Trump, obviously.”“Remember that Jesus meme?, He is the one that Donald Trump talked with before he posted it,” Daniels recalled. “And so that caused a whole kerfuffle for folks when that was reported out at the time. I will say this is, once again, just Donald Trump finding folks who have no experience. It doesn't matter to him, trying to figure out how do I get the things that I want?”Lemire closed with, "Tulsi Gabbard sort of sidelined herself because she disagreed with trump in the Iran war. So she was left out of a lot of key decisions. That's still a really important job and Pulte comes in here with zero experience in the intelligence community is a remarkable moment." - YouTube youtu.be

Trump names Bill Pulte acting director of national intelligence