Gabbard Roasted in Senate Hearing, Written Testimony Contradicts Trump

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard found herself sailing between Scylla and Charybdis today during her testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

Her written statement said Operation Midnight Hammer, the U.S. attack on Iran last June, ”obliterated” the nation’s nuclear capability. And, her statement said, Iran has not begun rebuilding it. But that claim undermined President Donald Trump’s oft-stated rationale for bombing Iran: to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

Worse still, under a grilling from far-left Democratic Senator Joel Ossoff of Georgia, Gabbard could not say Iran posed an “imminent nuclear threat” to the United States, as the White House has argued. And, she said, it is not the responsibility of the intelligence community to determine threats against the United States. Rather, she said, that is up to President Trump.

Iran Regime Still Functioning

While Gabbard’s written, 3,200-plus-word statement discussed China, Russia, North Korea, and even the MS-13 terror gang, what the former congresswoman from Hawaii disclosed about Iran invited the beating from Ossoff.

It belied Trump’s claim that Iran was close to developing an atom bomb. Indeed, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been peddling that claim for 30 years.

That aside, Gabbard’s written testimony about Iran began by saying the regime “appears to be intact but largely degraded by Operation Epic Fury.”

“Its regional power projection capabilities have been destroyed, leaving limited options,” she testified. Then again, she continued, “Iran and its proxies remain capable of and continue to attack U.S. and allied interests in the Middle East. If a hostile regime survives, it will seek to begin a yearslong effort to rebuild its missiles and UAV forces.”

Then came what appears to be a Kinsley gaffe; Gabbard inadvertently revealed a truth:

As a result of Operation Midnight Hammer, Iran’s nuclear enrichment program was obliterated. There has been no efforts [sic] since then to try to rebuild their enrichment capability. The entrances to the underground facilities that were bombed have been buried and shuttered with cement. We continue to monitor for any early indicators on what position the current or any new leadership in Iran will take with regard to authorizing a nuclear weapons program.

That last statement, which Gabbard says she omitted when she read the testimony for the sake of time, directly contradicts Trump’s stated reason for beginning the war.

When he launched Operation Epic Fury on February 28, Trump also said that Midnight Hammer “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear capability. But unlike Gabbard, who said Iran has not resumed efforts to build a nuclear weapon, Trump strongly suggested the country had done or would do just that.

“After that attack, we warned them never to resume their malicious pursuit of nuclear weapons, and we sought repeatedly to make a deal,” Trump said:

We tried. They wanted to do it. They didn’t want to do it. Again they wanted to do it. They didn’t want to do it. They didn’t know what was happening. They just wanted to practice evil. But Iran refused, just as it has for decades and decades.

Gabbard Roasted

Ossoff read Gabbard’s omitted testimony back to her, asking whether the intelligence community had concluded that Iran’s nuclear capability was “obliterated” in Operation Midnight Hammer.

“Yes,” Gabbard answered.

Then he read back Gabbard’s statement that Iran is not rebuilding its nuclear capability. “That is the assessment of the intelligence community,” Ossoff said. “Yes,” Gabbard replied.

Ossoff: The White House stated on March 1 of this year that this war was launched and was “a military campaign to eliminate the imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime.” That’s a statement from the White House.… Was it the assessment of the intelligence community that there was an imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime?

Gabbard: The intelligence community assessed that Iran maintained the intention to rebuild and to continue to grow their nuclear enrichment capability.

Ossoff: Was it the assessment of the intelligence community that there was an “imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime”? Yes or no? 

Gabbard: Senator, the only person who can determine what is and is not an imminent threat is the president.…

Ossoff: False. This is the Worldwide Threats Hearing, where you present to Congress national intelligence, timely, objective and independent of political considerations. You’ve stated today that the intelligence community’s assessment is that Iran’s nuclear enrichment program was obliterated and “there have been no efforts since then to try to rebuild their enrichment capability.” Was it the intelligence community’s assessment that, nevertheless, despite this obliteration, there was [an] “imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime”? Yes or no?

Gabbard:  It is not the intelligence community’s responsibility to determine what is and is not an imminent threat. That is up to the president. …

Ossoff: It is precisely your responsibility to determine what constitutes a threat to the United States. This is the Worldwide Threats Hearing.

In other words, no matter how Gabbard answered the question, she was in trouble.

Second Embarrassment This week

The Gabbard testimony is the second major embarrassment this week for Trump. It followed the resignation of National Counterterrorism Director Joe Kent, who quit his post because of the attack on Iran. 

In his resignation letter, Kent wrote that Iran was not a threat to the United States, and that Israel hornswoggled Trump into attacking Iran on its behalf.

“I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent wrote:

I support the values and the foreign policies that you campaigned on in 2016, 2020, 2024, which you enacted in your first term. Until June of 2025, you understood that the wars in the Middle East were a trap that robbed America of the precious lives of our patriots and depleted the wealth and prosperity of our nation.

Kent, Trump said of the former Green Beret and combat veteran, is “weak on security.”

“When somebody is working with us that says they didn’t think Iran was a threat, we don’t want those people,” Trump said. “They’re not smart people, or they’re not savvy people. Iran was a tremendous threat.”