Trump's new acting intel chief Bill Pulte arrives early, eyes firing hundreds

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: CNN Politics

Updated Jun 19, 2026, 8:50 AM ET
PUBLISHED Jun 19, 2026, 4:00 AM ET


President Donald Trump’s pick for acting director of national intelligence, Bill Pulte, showed up at his new job a day early on Thursday after asking for a list of every employee in the office so he could assess whether to fire them, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

The sources said Pulte is eyeing to cut hundreds of jobs at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI).

Pulte’s appearance at ODNI on Thursday caught staff off-guard, including the outgoing director, Tulsi Gabbard, who was given a brief heads up on the visit. Trump himself has said that Pulte, who is a Trump loyalist with no intelligence experience, would start his job on Friday. Pulte met with lawyers and staffers during his visit, the sources told CNN.

In his only other briefing with ODNI last week, Pulte asked staff if he could bring the President’s Daily Brief to his house, raising alarm bells among intelligence officials, according to one of the sources. That briefing is a highly classified set of intelligence on key national security matters of the day. The second source pushed back on this characterization, noting that the PDB is provided electronically. The PDB is generally offered to select officials via tablet or hard copy.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/19/politics/bill-pulte-intel-chief-takes-office

[CincyDem]

1. TSF's retribution for the Senate not including the SAFE Act in some recent spending bill.

[genxlib]

2. It should be against the law for an interim anything to make wholesale and irreversable changes

Not sure if anything can be done if a Senate approved appointment decides to decimate the place but a squatter with no qualifications should not have that kind of power

[CincyDem]

5. Agreed. Should be limited to decisions that only impact the next 120 days. They're caretakers, not change agents.

[slightlv]

8. I agree... and it will take years to regain the level of intelligence gathering

once we get this t admin out of office... and many of these people will never come back. They've probably had about enough of the constant threat of shut downs, firings, RIFs, and rights and privileges being take away from them.

Just another hole we're gonna have to pour money into in order to undo what t has done.

[Tim S]

3. He's supposed to start his Federal job on a Federal holiday?

[RussBLib]

9. Trump certainly does not respect Juneteenth

….he kill it in a minute if he could. So his bootlickers will likewise disrespect it.

https://russblib.blogspot.com/?m=1

[sop]

4. I suspect Trump derailed the confirmation process of Jay Clayton so Acting DNI Pulte could purge the agency.

Trump has appointed at least 31 "Acting" heads to lead government agencies since beginning his second term. That's how he implements his agenda and gets around the Congressional nominating process.

[dalton99a]

6. +1. He is using Pulte as a hatchet man

[amcgrath]

7. The PDB may well be delivered electronically,

But we all know that the communications between Pulte and Trump are not going to be anything they wish there to be a record of