I don't get it... / General Political Bitching Thread....lol

Harris underperformed with voters of color − particularly Latino voters − but also Black voters in urban centers such as Philadelphia, Detroit and Milwaukee. Harris carried Black voters 86%-12% and Latino voters 53%-45%, according to CNN exit polls. But in the 2020 election, Biden won Black voters by a wider 92%-8% margin over Trump, and Latino voters 65%-32%.



"I think this calls into question a lot of the traditional identity politics," Julián Castro, former secretary of Housing and Urban Development in the Obama administration, said on MSNBC. "This is going to rewrite I think how the parties approach Latinos and other groups."

What To Know About Tulsi Gabbard—Former Democrat Named Trump’s Director Of National Intelligence

Molly Bohannon

Forbes Staff

Molly Bohannon has been a Forbes news reporter since 2023.


Nov 13, 2024,04:39pm EST

Topline President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday named ex-Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard as his director of national intelligence, praising her experience as a veteran and her “broad support in both Parties” when announcing her appointment, even as Gabbard has blasted Democrats since leaving the party and emerged as a controversial figure on foreign policy matters.


President-elect Donald Trump (L) dances as he leaves the stage after speaking alongside former US ... [+]AFP via Getty Images

Key Facts

Gabbard—who served in the House representing Hawaii from 2013 to 2021 and briefly ran for president as a Democrat in 2020—endorsed Trump in August and joined his transition team shortly after.



Gabbard left the Democratic Party in 2022 to become an independent, saying at the time that Democrats were an “elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness,” before joining the Republican Party this October.



Gabbard has long been a critic of U.S. foreign policy—recently criticizing U.S. aid to Ukraine—and The New York Times reported her selection as director of intelligence indicates Trump’s intention to give foreign policy roles to those “deeply skeptical of the effectiveness of U.S. military intervention abroad.”



She drew criticism in 2017 after she quietly visited Syria and met with President Bashar al-Assad, saying at the time she did so “because I felt that it’s important that if we profess to truly care about the Syrian people, about their suffering, then we’ve got to be able to meet with anyone that we need to if there is a possibility that we can achieve peace.”



Two years later, during her presidential run, Gabbard refused to call him a war criminal and said he was “not the enemy of the United States because Syria does not pose a direct threat to the United States.”



Gabbard also did not give a direct answer when asked if she would trust the U.S. intelligence community if she were elected, saying, “We have, in our recent past, a situation where our own government told lies to the American people, and to the United Nations for that matter, to launch a war,” referencing the 2003 invasion of Iraq.



Gabbard was a member of the Hawaii National Guard and was deployed to Iraq in 2005, and said she endorsed Trump in part because she said he sees “war as a last resort” and “understands the grave responsibility that a president” bears for the lives of those serving their country.”