Ben Shapiro says Bill Pulte is a “bad pick” for DNI: “The more fringy appointments by the Trump administration, I do not think that they've worked out very well”
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From the June 3, 2026, edition of The Daily Wire's The Ben Shapiro Show
BEN SHAPIRO: Alright. So yesterday, the president announced that he was going to replace Tulsi Gabbard. She had to step down because her husband is having a a critical health issue. And he announced his replacement. Bill Pulte. Huh? What now? The what? So, the job of the DNI is to coordinate the intelligence gathering mechanisms of the various intelligence agencies ranging from the CIA to the FBI and all of the rest. It was basically designed as an office to break the Chinese wall between domestic law enforcement, the FBI, and foreign intelligence gathering, the CIA. After 9/11, that's really when the directorate of national intelligence became a thing. It's not a particularly powerful position per se, but you should probably have somebody who has foreign policy experience, who knows something about intelligence in that position. Bill Pulte is a weird pick.
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Now Pulte, while he was at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, he was most famous for going after Lisa Cook, who is one of the Federal Reserve Board governors, for supposed misapplication on her mortgage applications. And, of course, he had suggested a 50-year mortgage, which is kind of crazy. I'm going go no on this one. I have to say, the more fringy appointments by the Trump administration, I do not think that they've worked out very well. You can look at the departments that work well inside the Trump administration. State Department under Secretary Rubio, working pretty well. EPA under Lee Zeldin, working pretty well. Even some of the more out of the box picks, some of those have worked out well. I think that Pete Hegseth over at Defense has worked out pretty well. I think that Bill Pulte at DNI yeah, man, no. Senate majority leader John Thune said we don't need to weaponize DNI. John Cornyn of Texas said I see no evidence of any qualification for the job.
Now, again, one of the things that's happening here is that the president's ability to simply ram through nominees is basically gone at this point. The president has alienated too many sitting senators for that to happen. Very early in his administration, a lot of people, including, for example, Bill Cassidy, right, the primary — the ousted politician from Louisiana. Like, Bill Cassidy, in the end, voted to put RFK in charge of HHS. And, again, RFK is a bizarre pick, and I'm not in love with everything RFK has done over there. I had some questions at the time, but it's like, OK. Let the president cook. That was sort of the take in January 2025. I'm not sure that's the take today. The president has lost Thom Tillis. He's lost Bill Cassidy. He's lost Mitch McConnell. Susan Collins and Murkowski ain't going to vote for this. Thune ain't going to vote for this. You're like — the chances that Bill Pulte becomes anything but acting DNI, meaning he can be appointed temporarily until you actually hit the statutory limit, at which point he must be confirmed by the Senate. That's not going to last. That is not a good pick. That is a bad pick. I'll just put it right out there. Not — not a great pick.