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(WASHINGOTN) — Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard returns to Capitol Hill this week for an annual set of hearings on worldwide threats — her most significant public appearance in months and her clearest opportunity yet to address the intelligence picture surrounding the war in Iran.

Lawmakers are expected to press Gabbard on the administration’s handling of the Iran conflict, homeland security concerns, election integrity and the broader global threat environment at a moment of rising tension.

The hearings will also offer a rare extended look at an intelligence chief who has spent much of the past year largely out of public view. The Senate Intelligence Committee is scheduled to hear from her on Wednesday, March 18, with the House hearing set for Thursday, March 19.

She heads into the hearings under fresh scrutiny after the resignation of Joe Kent, the administration’s top counterterrorism official, who stepped down Tuesday over his objections to the Iran war — the highest-profile administration official to resign publicly over the conflict.

An ODNI official told ABC News that Gabbard was not asked by the White House to fire Kent, pushing back on a report first aired by Fox News.

Kent’s resignation sharpened questions already hanging over the administration’s case for war — whether Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States.

In his resignation letter, Kent said he could not “in good conscience” support the war and argued that Iran posed “no imminent threat” to the nation, directly undercutting President Donald Trump’s repeated public justification for the conflict.

Trump has previously said Tehran posed an imminent threat and was “very nearly” in a position to strike.

Hours after Kent’s resignation became public, Gabbard moved to publicly back Trump’s authority to make that call.

In a post on X, she said the president, as commander in chief, is responsible for determining “what is and is not an imminent threat” and whether action is necessary to protect U.S. troops, the American people and the country.

She added that ODNI’s role is to coordinate and integrate intelligence, so the president has the best information available to inform his decisions, and said Trump had concluded Iran posed an imminent threat after reviewing the available intelligence.

She did not directly address Kent’s allegations or mention him by name.

The moment is especially striking for Gabbard because few figures in Trump’s orbit spent more time warning about regime change wars, intelligence failures and the cost of Washington interventionism.

As a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, she was so vocal in her opposition to war with Iran that she sold “No War With Iran” T-shirts.

In an exclusive interview with ABC News last year, she again spoke about diplomacy, military restraint and the human cost of conflict in terms that reflected a worldview she has carried for years.

In that interview, Gabbard said the stress of her first deployment in her mid-20s turned part of her hair white, and that she kept the streak as a reminder of the high human cost of war.

“War must always be the last resort, only after all measures of diplomacy have been completely exhausted,” she told ABC News in the interview.

This week’s hearings will also unfold against the backdrop of Gabbard’s broader and unusually quiet tenure. Before taking office, she was rarely far from public view, frequently appearing on television, podcasts and social media.

As DNI, that version of her has largely faded from public view.

In recent months, she has appeared mostly in glimpses, at major administration moments.

Gabbard, a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve and the first person in U.S. history to serve as DNI while in military uniform, appeared in uniform at Dover Air Force Base earlier this month during the dignified transfer of six American soldiers killed in a drone strike in Kuwait in the opening hours of the war with Iran.

She also heads into the hearing with other controversies still hanging over her.

Gabbard has drawn scrutiny for her role in the administration’s election integrity push, including her appearance outside the FBI’s operation in Fulton County, Georgia, in January, where federal agents seized election materials tied to the 2020 election, and her subsequent acknowledgment that she arranged a call between President Donald Trump and the agents involved. She has also faced continuing questions about her investigations into election security in Puerto Rico and Arizona.

ABC News previously reported that Gabbard arranged a call between Trump and FBI agents involved in the seizure of election materials in Fulton County, an unusual move given the sensitivity of the investigation. In Arizona, a senior administration official told ABC News that Gabbard was not on the ground but was still “working across the agency to ensure election integrity.”

The hearing is shaping up as more than a routine annual threat assessment.

It will be the clearest public test yet of how Gabbard explains the role she has carved out inside the Trump administration, and how she reconciles the anti-war politics that helped define her rise with the office she now holds at the center of a war she is being asked to defend.

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(WASHINGTON) — In a rare public appearance, Chief Justice John Roberts on Tuesday addressed criticism of the Supreme Court, the federal judiciary and individual judges, saying “personally directed hostility is dangerous, and it’s got to stop.”

Roberts spoke generally about attacks on courts and judges, which have surged in recent years, during a conversation with U.S. District Court Judge Lee Rosenthal at the Baker Institute at Rice University.

He did not address any specific criticism or controversy, though the comments come at a time of heightened scrutiny of the court’s recent landmark decisions on presidential power.

“It does come with the territory,” Roberts said of criticism. “It can very much be healthy. We don’t believe that we’re flawless in any way. It is important that — important that our decisions are subjected to scrutiny, and they are. The problem sometimes is that the criticism can move from a focus on legal analysis to personalities.”

Violent threats against individual judges and justices have spiked, according to law enforcement officials. Four years ago, a man was arrested outside the home of Justice Brett Kavanaugh with the intention of assassinating him. He was later convicted and sentenced to eight years in prison.

Roberts was careful to say that no “one political perspective” is responsible for the threats, but that as they become more “personal” they “can be actually quite dangerous.”

“Judges around the country work very hard to get it right,” he said, “and if they don’t, their opinions are subject to criticism. But personally directed hostility is dangerous, and it’s got to stop.”

The remarks came on the heels of a fresh wave of criticism of the Supreme Court from President Donald Trump, who has accused Roberts and several of his peers — some of whom Trump appointed to the court — of being “disloyal” and “unpatriotic” after they ruled against his sweeping global tariffs program. Trump alleged on Monday that the court is a “weaponized and unjust political organization” that is “hurting our country.”

Trump has also singled out U.S. District Judge James Boasberg for intense criticism after Boasberg on Friday blocked the Justice Department’s subpoenas of Fed Chair Jerome Powell as part of a criminal investigation into his handling of a multibillion-dollar renovation of the Federal Reserve Building.

Last year, Trump called for Boasberg’s impeachment after the judge temporarily blocked the administration’s fast-tracked deportations to Venezuela. The comments prompted a rare public response at the time from Roberts, who said in a statement that impeachment was not an appropriate recourse for a losing party in a case.

Overall, Trump has had a favorable track record at the high court during the first year of his second term, winning nearly every emergency request of permission to move forward with controversial policies being litigated in lower courts. He has also benefitted from a 2025 landmark ruling that limited the ability of judges to issue nationwide injunctions and a sweeping 2024 decision granting presidential immunity from criminal prosecution.

“I actually try not to read outside criticism too much,” Roberts told Rosenthal. “And it’s, you know, just because you’re on to something else, and you don’t want to worry too much about — you’ve done your best and that’s all you can do.”

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(WASHINGTON) — After NATO allies rebuffed his call to assist the U.S. in securing the critical Strait of Hormuz, President Donald Trump said on Tuesday the U.S. doesn’t need their help after all.

“I think NATO’s making a very foolish mistake,” Trump said, airing out his grievances with the transatlantic alliance during an Oval Office meeting with Ireland’s Taoiseach Micheál Martin.

“This was a great test because we don’t need them, but they should have been there,” the president added.

Trump over the weekend requested U.S. partners in Europe and Asia send warships to help police the strait, where roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil supply is caught in the crosshairs of the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran.

No country has publicly announced plans to send ships or other kinds of assistance to unblock the strait.

“This is not our war; we did not start it,” German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said on Monday.

“We will not be drawn into the wider war,” British Prime Minister Keir Starmer similarly said.

Despite the cold shoulder from several allies, President Trump on Monday said that “numerous countries” had told him “they’re on the way.” Trump did not identify which countries, and said that Secretary of State Marco Rubio would soon provide a list.

As of Tuesday afternoon, no list had been released.

When asked what countries would join in a coalition to secure the strait, Trump said he’s had “great support from the Middle East” including Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and “of course Israel” — but did not explicitly say what those countries would be doing.

In a social media post on Tuesday, Trump wrote the U.S. military had been “informed by most of our NATO ‘Allies’ that they don’t want to get involved with our Military Operation against the Terrorist Regime of Iran, in the Middle East, this, despite the fact that almost every Country strongly agreed with what we are doing, and that Iran cannot, in any way, shape, or form, be allowed to have a Nuclear Weapon.”

Trump said the U.S. didn’t need the assistance from those countries, or from “Japan, Australia and South Korea.”

“Well, we don’t need too much help, and we don’t need any help, actually,” Trump later said in the Oval Office.

When asked if he would retaliate against NATO countries for not heeding his call or if he was rethinking the alliance, Trump said no.

“I have nothing currently in mind. But I will say that I’m not exactly thrilled,” Trump said.

Trump pointed to the assistance the U.S. provided to help Ukraine fight Russia’s invasion under the Biden administration as he criticized NATO for not stepping in to help with reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

“You would have thought they would have said, ‘We’d love to send a couple of minesweepers,'” Trump said. “It’s not a big deal. It doesn’t cost very much money. But they didn’t do that. So, you know, it’s — I think it’s very unfair to the United States, not to me, but to the United States.”

Meanwhile, the impact of Iran’s stranglehold is being felt abroad and at home. The price of oil has hovered around $100 a barrel this week. In the U.S., the national average for a gallon of gas is $3.79 — up about 88 cents from a month ago.

President Trump had also called on China, which Iran is still allowing to transit the Gulf, to assist in the Strait of Hormuz. The response from China’s foreign ministry was a call for all parties to immediately stop military operations.

President Trump announced Tuesday that his previously planned trip to China is now postponed for five to six weeks. Trump didn’t provide details on why, only that he was “resetting the meeting” originally scheduled for early April.

“I look forward to seeing President Xi. He looks forward to seeing me, I think,” Trump said.

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(WASHINGTON) — Mayors from Minnesota to Louisiana traveled to Washington earlier this month with a bipartisan message that protecting the Mississippi River is not just an environmental issue, it is a matter of national security.

The mayors met with lawmakers and federal officials, including the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Homeland Security, as part of their annual Mississippi River Cities & Towns Initiative fly-in, and later spoke with ABC News about growing pressures facing the river corridor.

Stretching more than 2,300 miles through 10 states, the Mississippi River forms the backbone of one of the most important economic corridors in America. According to data shared by the mayors’ coalition, the river system generates nearly $500 billion in annual revenue and directly supports about 1.5 million jobs.

Its waters also carry a massive share of the nation’s agricultural exports, making the river central to U.S. and global food supply chains. According to the National Park Service, the Mississippi River Basin accounts for 92% of America’s agricultural exports, including 78% of the world’s exports of grains and soybeans.

Founded in 2012, the Mississippi River Cities & Towns Initiative (MRCTI) brings together local governments along the river corridor to coordinate priorities including clean water, economic stability, disaster resilience and food security.

However, this year’s trip to Washington came with new urgency.

Several mayors said the rise of artificial intelligence, declining infrastructure, growing demand for water and energy, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East affecting fuel prices and increasingly severe weather events are placing unprecedented pressures on the region.

One concern raised during the discussions was growing interest from water-scarce regions in the western U.S.

“The Colorado River Basin is looking at the Mississippi River Basin to move water into areas of Phoenix, Vegas — the places that are most water insecure on the continent,” Colin Wellenkamp, executive director of MRCTI and a Missouri state representative, told ABC News.

He added they “are looking into the Mississippi River basin for their water supply for the future.”

Coalition co-chair Mayor Melisa Logan of Blytheville, Arkansas, said the river system has become a national security concern as water demands grow.

“This water is absolutely essential for the security of the country, and you move it to another basin irresponsibly, right? That puts the nation at risk,” Logan told ABC News.

Several major U.S. water systems are already governed by interstate compacts, including the Great Lakes Water Compact and the Delaware River Basin Compact. These legally binding agreements, often approved by Congress, help to establish rules for managing and protecting shared water resources.

Supporters of a Mississippi River Compact say a similar framework could help coordinate policy across the 10 states that rely on a basin that supports national and international trade and food supply chains.

“That’s why these mayors are pursuing a Mississippi River Compact to protect the Mississippi,” Wellenkamp said.

He noted that his state passed a law for such an agreement.

“The other nine states aren’t far behind, because this is a real risk in the future,” Wellenkamp added.

Beyond water access, many mayors said the rising cost of disasters has become another urgent concern for communities along the river.

Logan, Blytheville’s mayor, said protecting the river requires key coordination across state lines, as communities along the river often struggle to secure federal funding for projects that cross state boundaries.

“Typically, they do it state by state by state,” Logan said, referring to federal funding programs. “But these impacts are multi-state by watershed.”

According to MRCTI materials, natural disasters along the Mississippi River corridor have caused more than $250 billion in losses since 2005.

Mayor Buz Craft of Vidalia, Louisiana, said local leaders often face delays when seeking federal disaster assistance.

“We need Congress to quit changing the goal post, for example, when we have an issue, whether it’s a tornado or hurricane,” he said.

Changing White House administrations can also put them back to square one, Craft noted.

“Just when you are about to get that funding for that past disaster they say ‘Oh, now you got to go through this,’ start all over and apply to this program, and it’s really a rat race,” he said.

Global instability is also beginning to show up in everyday costs for residents along the river. Several of the mayors said fuel prices along the Mississippi River recently jumped about 20 cents overnight. Those increases can quickly ripple through food prices, the mayors said, because much of the nation’s food supply moves by truck, rail or barge along the Mississippi River system.

Meanwhile, some communities are also preparing for a different kind of pressure, the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence infrastructure. The data centers that power AI systems require massive amounts of electricity and water for cooling, placing new increased demands on local power grids and water systems.

Mayor David Goins of Alton, Illinois, said companies have already begun exploring potential sites in his city.

“I think it’s important to get in front of it and get ahead of it,” he said. “This meeting right here is timely to get the resources that we can, that we can have at our disposal through different companies, organizations, to start preparing ordinances and start getting some type of framework or groundwork, because it’s coming.”

For the mayors gathered in Washington, the message they hoped policymakers would hear was simple: the Mississippi River’s importance stretches far beyond the cities along its banks.

“If you don’t live on the Mississippi River, you don’t necessarily understand the importance of the Mississippi River Basin to our entire continent,” Quincy, Illinois, Mayor Linda Moore said. “One in 12 people in the world is fed by food that flows up and down the Mississippi on a barge or from the river itself.”

For the mayors who traveled to Washington this week, the Mississippi River is more than a waterway — it is an economic lifeline whose currents shape American agriculture, trade and communities across the country.

Mayor Hollies Winston of Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, said the river’s influence reaches far beyond the 10 states it touches, and may stretch long into the future.

“If that water is not protected, we don’t know the impact that that has on the economy 15, 20, 30 years from now,” Winston said.

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