Three of President Donald Trump’s most controversial cabinet nominees faced charged Senate hearings this week – but the only ones facing real doubts about their confirmation are the former Democrats.
Director of national intelligence nominee Tulsi Gabbard, secretary of health and human services nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Federal Bureau of Investigation director nominee Kash Patel all faced Senate hearings Thursday.
The split-screen was remarkable: As Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Gabbard faced pointed and aggressive questions from lawmakers in both parties, Mr. Patel had Republican lawmakers falling over themselves to rally to his defense.
Why We Wrote This
Three of President Trump’s controversial Cabinet picks faced confirmation hearings Thursday. But it’s clear the road is toughest for the two nominees who are former Democrats.
This week marked the first time that any of Mr. Trump’s nominees have faced tough questioning from Republicans. The rest of his cabinet has sailed through, albeit in some cases with little to no Democratic support. Even Pete Hegseth, who was confirmed as defense secretary with a tie-breaking vote from Vice President JD Vance after three Republicans voted against him, got mostly softball questioning from Republicans during his confirmation hearing earlier this month. (Mr. Trump’s initial pick for Attorney General, Matt Gaetz, had so many Republicans opposing his nomination that he quickly withdrew.)
Part of this is due to controversial actions and heterodox and unusual views expressed by Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Gabbard, the two former Democrats who broke with their party to back Mr. Trump in the 2024 election. Mr. Kennedy faced tough questions from Republicans about peddling health and vaccine conspiracy theories. Ms. Gabbard was grilled about her past support for Edward Snowden, who publicized a trove of classified information about government surveillance techniques – an act the U.S. intelligence community contends put Americans at risk – and who repatriated to Russia to avoid prosecution.
Mr. Patel faced none of the same treatment from Republican senators over his claims that the 2020 election was rigged, his support for Jan. 6 rioters, his promise to “come after” journalists who’d been critical of Mr. Trump, or a litany of other controversial statements.
Another big difference was the forum each of these nominees faced. The Judiciary Committee, which vetted Mr. Patel, is one of the most partisan in the Senate, mostly made up of hardliners who are unlikely to break with party orthodoxy. Ms. Gabbard, on the other hand, had to answer questions from lawmakers on the Senate Intelligence Committee, a bastion of bipartisan cooperation, while Mr. Kennedy’s second hearing was with the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee.
And while Mr. Trump likes Ms. Gabbard and Mr. Kennedy, and wants to reward them for supporting his 2024 campaign, he can find other options who share his vision to do those jobs if they fail – making it easier for Republicans to potentially break with him on this. Mr. Patel’s nomination is a top priority for the president, both because he’s proven himself such a fierce defender and because Mr. Trump cares so much about bringing the FBI to heel.
But the biggest difference for the GOP senators might be that these two picks are ex-Democrats who still hold some liberal views – and have little trust from the president’s party. Mr. Kennedy, a scion of one of the Democratic Party’s most famous families, first ran for president as a Democrat in 2024, then switched to an independent bid before eventually endorsing Mr. Trump. Ms. Gabbard served in the House as a Democratic representative from Hawaii, and ran for president as a Democrat as recently as 2020.
Here’s how each hearing went.
Tulsi Gabbard in trouble?
A number of Republicans seemed less than eager to allow Ms. Gabbard to become Director of National Intelligence. They asked her why she’d long defended Mr. Snowden, why she met with Syrian Dictator Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war and had questioned the consensus from the intelligence community that he’d used chemical weapons against his own people, and why she’d echoed Russia’s talking points in the early days of its invasion of Ukraine.
Republican Sen. Jerry Moran of Kansas asked Ms. Gabbard to help him “make certain that in no way does Russia get a pass either in your mind or your heart,” leading her to retort: “Senator, I’m offended by the question.”
Moderate Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine grilled her over whether she genuinely had come around to supporting Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows the government to surveil foreigners without a warrant. Ms. Gabbard has said she came to support the program after recent reforms. But earlier on in the hearing, Democratic committee co-chairman Mark Warner of Virginia pointed out that she had said those reforms “took an already bad problem and made it many, many times worse” shortly after they were passed by Congress.
She repeatedly refused to agree with GOP Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma’s request that she call Mr. Snowden a “traitor,” though she agreed he had broken the law.
GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Todd Young of Indiana asked pointed questions as well – Senator Young read a social media post Mr. Snowden had made during the hearing, and asked Ms. Gabbard how she thinks she’ll “be received” by members of the intelligence community given her longtime defense of Mr. Snowden.
By the end of the public portion of the hearing, it was far from clear if she’d won over a majority of the committee.
RFK Jr. faces tough questions
Mr. Kennedy faced pointed questions and skepticism from members of both parties on the HELP Committee on Thursday – including GOP chairman Bill Cassidy of Louisiana.
“It’s no secret, I have some reservations about your past positions on vaccines and a couple of other issues,” Senator Cassidy said in his opening remarks, later saying that Mr. Kennedy’s history of “undermining confidence in vaccines with unfounded or misleading arguments concerns me.”
Mr. Cassidy, a physician, spoke from personal experience, describing a young patient who had nearly died from a illness vaccines can prevent. “I’ve tried to do everything I can to make sure I never have to speak to another parent about their child dying due to a vaccine-preventable disease.”
During the hearing, he practically begged Mr. Kennedy to renounce his claims – not backed by any serious scientific research – of a link between vaccines and autism.
He didn’t seem satisfied at the end of the hearing, criticizing a study Mr. Kennedy had cited as medically sound during the hearing that had been produced by an anti-vaccine group.
Mr. Cassidy praised Mr. Kennedy for some of his “make America healthy again” concern about issues like ultraprocessed foods, diet, and exercise. But he said Mr. Kennedy had spent decades criticizing vaccines “using selective evidence to cast doubt” and was financially vested in doing so.
He was joined in skeptical questioning from GOP Senators Collins and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
The hearing was the second in two days for Mr. Kennedy – the first was in front of the Senate Finance Committee, which is the committee that will vote on whether or not to advance his nomination to the Senate floor. During that hearing, he faced tough questions from Republicans about his evolving views on abortion access, and struggled with details about how programs under the purview of HHS operated, stumbling over questions about Medicaid. Senator Cassidy is on that committee as well, and could join with Democrats to block the committee’s approval of Mr. Kennedy before a full Senate vote.
He told Mr. Kennedy at the end of Thursday’s HELP Committee hearing that he might hear from him on his decision this weekend.
Kash Patel gets the GOP red carpet treatment
Mr. Patel has a long record as a fierce pugilist for President Trump, pushing some of the pro-Trump orbit’s most dubious theories: He made false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from Mr. Trump, and called the convicted Jan. 6 rioters who attacked the Capitol and threatened the safety of lawmakers in both parties “political prisoners.” He has also called the agency he now wants to run the worst part of the “deep state,” and published a list of 60 government officials in both parties that he said were “corrupt actors.”
But on Thursday, only Democrats asked him tough questions about that long history of controversy.
He broke with President Trump on one point, saying he disagreed with his decision to pardon those convicted of violent rioting on Jan. 6, 2021. “I do not agree with the commutation of any sentence of any individual who committed violence against law enforcement,” he said.
And he sought to tamp down worry that he’ll weaponize the FBI against Mr. Trump’s perceived enemies – concerns held by some of the Republicans who worked with him during the first Trump administration.
“I have no interest, no desire, and will not, If confirmed, go backwards,” he said, referring to the view held by many Republicans that the agency acted with bias against Mr. Trump in recent years. “There will be no politicization at the FBI. There will be no retributive actions taken by any FBI.”
The tone of the hearing suggested that he’s almost certain to get the GOP support needed to get voted out of committee – and likely to get the votes needed on the Senate floor to get confirmed.
