Huge fire in southern Tehran following Israeli attacks
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The Hill
25 minutes ago
- The Hill
Gabbard slashing intelligence office workforce, cutting budget by more than $700 million
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Office of the Director of National Intelligence will dramatically reduce its workforce and cut its budget by more than $700 million annually, the Trump administration announced Wednesday. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said in a statement, 'Over the last 20 years, ODNI has become bloated and inefficient, and the intelligence community is rife with abuse of power, unauthorized leaks of classified intelligence, and politicized weaponization of intelligence.' She said the intelligence community 'must make serious changes to fulfill its responsibility to the American people and the U.S. Constitution by focusing on our core mission: find the truth and provide objective, unbiased, timely intelligence to the President and policymakers.' The reorganization is part of a broader administration effort to rethink its evaluation of foreign threats to American elections, a topic that has become politically loaded given President Donald Trump's long-running resistance to the intelligence community's assessment that Russia interfered on his behalf in the 2016 election. In February, for instance, Attorney General Pam Bondi disbanded an FBI task force focused on investigating foreign influence operations, including those that target U.S. elections. The Trump administration also has made sweeping cuts at the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which oversees the nation's critical infrastructure, including election systems. Gabbard's efforts to downsize the agency she leads is in keeping with the cost-cutting mandate the administration has employed since its earliest days, when Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency oversaw mass layoffs of the federal workforce. It's the latest headline-making move by a key official who just a few months ago had seemed out of favor with Trump over her analysis of Iran's nuclear capabilities but who in recent weeks has emerged as a key loyalist. She's released a series of documents meant to call into question the legitimacy of the intelligence community's findings on Russian election interference in 2016, and this week, at Trump's direction, revoked the security clearances of 37 current and former government officials. The ODNI in the past has joined forces with other federal agencies to debunk and alert the public to foreign disinformation intended to influence U.S. voters. For example, it was involved in an effort to raise awareness about a Russian video that falsely depicted mail-in ballots being destroyed in Pennsylvania that circulated widely on social media in the weeks before the 2024 presidential election. Notably, Gabbard said she would be refocusing the priorities of the Foreign Malign Influence Center, which her office says on its website is 'focused on mitigating threats to democracy and U.S. national interests from foreign malign influence.' It wasn't clear from Gabbard's release or fact sheet exactly what the changes would entail, but Gabbard noted its 'hyper-focus' on work tied to elections and said the center was 'used by the previous administration to justify the suppression of free speech and to censor political opposition.' The Biden administration created the Foreign Malign Influence Center in 2022, responding to what the U.S. intelligence community had assessed as attempts by Russia and other adversaries to interfere with American elections. Its role, ODNI said when it announced the center's creation, was to coordinate and integrate intelligence pertaining to malign influence. In a briefing given to reporters in 2024, ODNI officials said they only notified candidates, political organizations and local election offices of disinformation operations when they could be attributed to foreign sources. They said they worked to avoid any appearance of policing Americans' speech. Sen. Tom Cotton, the Republican chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, hailed the decision to broadly revamp ODNI, saying it would make it a 'stronger and more effective national security tool for President Trump.'
New York Times
27 minutes ago
- New York Times
Thursday Briefing: Israel's Planned Offensive
Israel prepared an assault on Gaza City Israeli officials said yesterday that the military was moving forward with plans to take over Gaza City. Even after nearly two years of war, the city and its surrounding neighborhoods remain a stronghold for Hamas, an official said. An Israeli military official said that troops had reached the city's outskirts and that tents were being moved into southern Gaza for people who would be displaced once the operation begins. The plan called for troops to encircle the city, allow the population to move south through checkpoints to catch militants, then move in with force. About 60,000 reservists would be called to backfill troops sent to Gaza City, and 20,000 would have their orders extended. The buildup began as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu weighed a cease-fire proposal, agreed upon by Hamas, that would ensure the release of some hostages. In Israel, the families of hostages are worried that Hamas would kill them in response to the offensive, while hard-right politicians threatened to quit the government if Netanyahu were to accept the cease-fire deal. In Gaza City, thousands considered moving to the central or southern parts of the territory. But many of the city's inhabitants have already relocated repeatedly — some said they won't do so again. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Bloomberg
27 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Microsoft Activists Detained Protesting Israel Ties at HQ Campus
Microsoft Corp. activist employees and supporters were detained by police after returning to the company's headquarters for a second day to demand that the software maker sever business ties with the Israeli military. Protesters were warned to leave on Tuesday or face trespassing charges, and quickly did so. They gathered again Wednesday afternoon, setting up tents and chanting slogans.
