DNI
Tulsi Gabbard Delivers Remarks at 2026 Independent Women’s Policy Summit
May 8, 2026 | sundance
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On May 7, 2026, Director of National
Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard addressed the 2026 Independent Women’s Policy Summit
in Washington, D.C. Given her current position at the tip of the IC accountability
spear, it is worth reviewing DNI Gabbard’s remarks. The transcript of her
speech is below.
[Transcript] – “Thank you so much for the introduction.
Carrie, thank you for your leadership and all of the hard work that goes into
making this day possible, and, of course, thanks to all of you for being here
and for your support of the tremendous work that IWF does. I’m trying to
remember what year I kind of first started getting involved. It might’ve been
around the end of my time in Congress, but it’s been incredible to see the
trajectory just over the last five, six years and the impact that IWF has had,
and how much it has sparked and inspired people, women and girls, people all
across the country, to take it upon themselves to really be the solution and
confront the grave and serious and historic challenges that we are facing
today. I think the focus of this summit today is around leadership, which is
essential.
I have found too often in my time in politics, now that has spanned over
20-something years, my time serving in the military in different capacities,
you know, the challenge and opportunity of leadership is a perpetual one. I
find it now in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the
Intelligence Community across the board. And too often, what I see, especially
in some of our young women and girls, but even some of the moms groups that
I’ve met over the years, is a concern or question around not being qualified to
lead.”
“Whether it’s running for office or taking on an organization, or going and
testifying before Congress or before a school board meeting, people who haven’t
done it before, never imagined themselves to be in this position, often say,
“Well, you know, someone else can do it. Someone else will be better to do it.
Someone else is more experienced. Someone else has the right qualifications and
meets that criteria, for example, to be a candidate for office.”
And my response to them is always to focus on the most important
characteristic that we should all look for in a leader, and that we should
strive for in the leaders whom we choose to elect and that we choose to
support. And that characteristic is someone who cares. If you care about
serving and making a positive impact on your community, your state, your
country, you will therefore then care about telling the truth.
You’ll care about standing up for what is right. And the courage that we
see, especially in this vitriolic political environment that we are in, that
courage is necessary because of the radical responses that we all get when we
do very simple, common-sense things like stand up for the truth and speak the
objective truth.
And obviously, the foremost example, and the one that’s been really
gratifying to see the progress around, is the truth of the biological
difference between men and women and girls and boys, and that, you know, girls
should be able to play sports against girls. It’s a perfect case study. I think
the fundamental issue is so much greater than this example because this whole
fight and this whole challenge is impacting a generation. But when you look at
what’s really at stake, the existence and acceptance that there is such a thing
as objective truth is really the issue. And so this is the current fight over
this, and the progress that’s been made here in the US and around the world
with a lot of these international sporting entities is truly incredible. But it
all drives down to the implications of what happens when we live in a society
that rejects the existence of objective truth.
It erodes and removes the guardrails that must exist in our society, that
there is such a thing as truth, that we expect our lawmakers and our leaders to
understand that there is such a thing as truth, and that we expect our media to
understand that there is such a thing as truth. How does a journalist, a true,
honest journalist, which is a rare breed these days–I know we have a few in the
room, thank you for being here. How does a journalist report on the truth if
they, the journalist or their outlet, reject the existence of truth?
You can apply this almost universally across the board, but all of this
comes back to courage. When we care about each other, when we care about our
country, when we care about the consequences of the decisions being made by
policymakers, when we care about our Constitution, our fundamental freedoms,
the bedrock of this republic that we are citizens of, that is the qualification
that we need to step up and lead and to make that difference.
I went through my own version of facing these constant challenges and
questions in the ways that I have tried to and chosen to serve over the last
few decades, where people constantly told me, “You are too young. You are not
qualified. You don’t have an Ivy League degree. You don’t have a degree at
all,” back in the day. But I– I’m grateful to my parents for this, they
homeschooled us– I’m the fourth of five kids. They instilled this ethic of
service and being the solution to a problem that you see, that no matter the
detractors who came my way, even those who meant well, who said, “Oh, you know,
you’re too young to run for Congress.”
I was 31 at the time. “You’re too young to run for Congress. You know, the
other guy who’s running, he’s got all the money, he’s got all the endorsements,
he’s gonna win. Just hang back and try again in 20 years,” And they thought
they were giving me good advice and were being helpful. And I smiled, and this
is Hawaii, so I said, “Thank you, aloha.” And then proceeded to ignore their
very helpful feedback.
But they were looking at all of the wrong things. They were looking at what
they viewed as, like, the political resume, the political establishment
requirements, rather, and fundamentally forgetting the most important thing,
which is we step up to serve the people, period. And in my race for Congress,
that was the big difference. I was running against a candidate who was highly
funded, had all the endorsements, and nearly a hundred percent name
recognition. He had just run a statewide race and lost. And my seat was
essentially a statewide seat. He thought he was gonna win the big final debate
night that we had.
I remember we were in two different green rooms right next to each other,
about to walk out in the debate. I’d known him forever. It’s Hawaii, you know,
we know everybody. And as he walked out two minutes before me, he was singing a
song. He’s a former basketball player, probably like 6’8”. And he looked back
over his shoulder at me as I was about to walk out, singing the Black-Eyed Peas
song. And he looked at me, and he was like, “Tonight’s gonna be a good night.”
And I smashed him in the debate… because he took it for granted. He took the
people for granted. He took me for granted. And so he didn’t prepare. I am a
prepper. I did the work, and I came with the goods, and I was running on a very
clear platform based on substance and how I could best serve my community. So,
fast forward, I had like 3% name recognition when we started this race. Five
months before the election, I had, I think, 20% in the polls. He had 60%. And
there were a couple of other candidates who kind of had broken out the rest of
the margins. He was already interviewing staff that he planned to hire for his
office in Congress at that point in time. And then I ended up winning the race
and beating him by a 22% margin.
We spent the same amount of money, but arguably, on paper, he was the
candidate who was definitely going to win. As he was interviewing his future
staff, I was going island by island, holding town halls, knocking on doors,
standing outside the supermarket, introducing myself to people, and saying,
“I’m interviewing for a job to work for you. How can I serve you? What do you
care most about? Here’s what I care about and here’s what I stand for.” And I
point to this story often as I’m talking to folks who are thinking about
running for Congress, who are thinking to themselves, like, “How can I get
involved? I don’t even know where to start.” And usually always going back to,
“Well, I don’t have the resume that’s required. I don’t have the money. I can’t
self-fund. I don’t know how to pick up the phone and call a donor to ask for
support.”
And I tell them my story because it’s a real one. Because that was me. That
was me. And when we focus on having that servant’s heart guiding us, inspiring
us, giving us that courage every single day, and focusing on those whom we are
trying to serve and positively impact, this goes back to the vision that our
founders had for our country. Truly, how do we have a government of, by, and
for the people?
We have real people, not those who’ve been handpicked by the powers that be.
We have real people who care and who want to serve, who are stepping up and
responding to one of my favorite verses in the Bible from Isaiah 6:8, when the
Lord says, “Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?” “Here I am, Lord, send me.”
He didn’t ask for a resume. He didn’t say, “Well, are you qualified?”
He said, “Who will go for us?” He said, “Here I am, send me.” And that, to
me, is the fundamental question. It’s one that I ask and reflect on myself on a
daily basis: how can I best serve? How and where can I make that most positive
impact? And continuously reflecting on that throughout my life, it’s taken me
in a lot of different interesting directions. It’s taken me in different
political positions.
I started out in the State House when I was 21 years old, and then to
Congress. When I got elected to Congress, the Democratic Party somehow rolled
out the red, red carpet. I was named a, you know, the rising star. CNN was
talking about who was gonna play me in the movie. True story. I was like, “I
don’t know what’s going on here.” Vogue Magazine wanted to do a spread and,
like, all of this stuff.
And I was like, “Hmm, this is interesting. How can I use any of these
opportunities as a platform to be able to make the positive impact that I
wanted to make?” The problem with them was that they really thought I was gonna
be a puppet for them, and that whatever they were dangling in front of me was
somehow going to entice me into allowing them to control what I was there to
do. It didn’t last long.
Within a few months, then-President Obama was coming to Congress and wanted
to start a new war in the Middle East, this time in Syria. And I was the first
Democrat, that’s maybe the only one, I don’t remember, but the first Democrat
who came out publicly and opposed his request and gave very specific reasons
why. I was on the House Foreign Affairs Committee at the time, which was based
on my own experience of having deployed to the Middle East twice and
understanding the implications of what he was asking Congress to approve.
And the fact that the very most basic questions that we should always ask,
especially when you’re talking about sending our men and women in uniform into
harm’s way, is what is the objective?
At that time, John Kerry was the Secretary of State, and he came before the
committee, and I came in with an open mind, saying, “Hey, if this is something
we have to do to secure our nation, we have to take a hard look at it.” But
when I asked what was the objective, they said, “Oh, well, we wanna go in and
deliver a punch in the gut to the Syrian regime. Not a pinprick, not a
decapitation. We wanna deliver a punch in the gut.”
I was like, “Okay, that’s not a clear objective. How does that serve our
best interests as a country? How does that secure our nation? How does that
make the American people more safe? And what’s the plan?” I asked. “When they
punch back, or their friends punch back?” “Oh, we don’t think they will.” Like,
also not a good plan. “We don’t think they will.”
But by taking that step and asking the tough questions, doing the work, and
coming out in opposition to President Obama’s request at that time, the red
carpet was quickly rolled up and taken away. I got a very quick call from the
White House saying, “How dare you go against your president?” They had no
questions and no statements to make about the substance of the issues and
questions that I had raised. And that was the first of many examples that would
follow over the eight years that I was in Congress, where I realized that they
weren’t actually interested.
You know, they made a big deal. “I’m a veteran. I deployed twice to the
Middle East.” They weren’t actually interested in hearing what I had to say or
drawing on the experience that I had. And ultimately it became about their own,
their own partisan politics.
It became evident again, you know, the Democratic Party used to call
themselves the party of women, the party that champions women. I found out at a
number of women’s events that they only like a certain kind of woman that will
say certain things and had no problem dismissing other women, women candidates,
women of color.
I experienced this a lot when I ran for president in 2020. There was a forum
where they had all of the female candidates there, and it was called She The
People. The Washington Post covered the event, and I was not mentioned anywhere
in the article. And so I had my press person call ’em up. They’re like, “Hey,
Tulsi was there.” He was like, “Yeah, I know.” Like, “Okay, so why wouldn’t you
report all of the female candidates that are there?” He was like, “I have no
obligation to do so.”
One of many examples I could tell you about the bias of, you know, the
so-called mainstream media. But all of it, again, pointing back to my initial
message, that when we have people who care more about power than they do about
the people, then everything starts to fall apart.
We’ve got tremendous leaders now, and I give so much credit to President
Trump and the cabinet that he’s assembled, really hand-selecting people to lead
each of these different agencies and saying, “Okay, I’m giving you this
privilege of service and giving you this responsibility to lead. Now go out and
deliver results.” And as you all know, the man does not rest. He is sprinting
every single day, and he expects those results to be delivered, but he empowers
the leaders on his team to actually go out and do the work.
And when we look at the high tempo across the board, whether you’re talking
about Kelly Loeffler, who’s, you know, featured this week, it’s Small Business
Week. But what a lot of people don’t see is the tremendous work she’s doing
behind the scenes.
You have Sean Duffy, who’s going out and really, really doing a long-overdue
revamp of the Department of Transportation, which, by the way, little side
story there, he shared with me in his first conversations with his predecessor,
Pete Buttigieg, you know, they’re doing a handoff. And Pete told him, Pete told
Sean Duffy, he’s like, “Don’t worry about it. The organization basically runs
itself.”
But you look at what Sean has done, you know, Sean and Rachel are great
friends, but you look at what Sean has done, what he has uncovered with the
infrastructure that we all rely on just to travel across the country, the
safety of Americans. And you look at what happens and the difference when you
have leaders who care and who are leaning into that mission of service,
focusing on that mission every single day, versus those who are in it just for
the optics or just for the resume bullet. And that’s where IWF has done and
continues to do such tremendous work in bringing up, supporting, and empowering
leaders across the country.
In 2024, I had the opportunity in the fall to go. I was in Reno and went to
watch one of the girls’ basketball and volleyball games there. And this was one
of the teams that was taking a very principled and courageous stand to not play
against any of the volleyball teams that had a biological male on the women’s
team. And it was so cool just to be there to offer our support.
Markwayne Mullin was there with me to offer our support to these young
women. And then to see them, we invited some of them. This was right before the
Madison Square Garden rally, the final, the big Trump rally. And to then see
them go on and start doing media interviews, and to see them then go on and
start to do things they never ever thought that they’d be capable of doing. And
seeing how they, along with Riley Gaines and all of these incredible young
women, really demonstrated the power of their voice and their personal
experience that helped to trigger and inspire truly historic change that we’re
continuing to see unfold.
And that’s really where, when we look at the opportunity that all of you,
whether you’re donors or supporters, or your candidates, or those who are
working on policy issues on the Hill, while we may not see results as quickly
as we would like, this is a moment that requires all of us to not only look at
ourselves in the mirror every day and say, “How can I do more? How can I be a
part of the solution?” But in doing so, recognize that the decisions and the
actions that we take, whether we realize it or not, are inspiring others to do
the same. Where they may say, “If she can do that, maybe I can too.” I’ve been
grateful to have experienced this over and over and over again and to help be
that supporting voice, to encourage people to step outside of their comfort
zone, to not be afraid of that discomfort, and to remain truly rooted in a
spiritual foundation, recognizing the great responsibility that we have.
People don’t believe me when I tell them this, but my younger sister would
attest to it. But growing up, fourth of five, my head was buried in books. I
did martial arts. I was surfing, but I was extremely shy and am a textbook
introvert. And so when I first decided to run for office in Hawaii when I was
21, I will never forget the first speech I gave. It was in an elementary school
cafeteria in Waipahu on the island of Oahu. And I had to give a three-minute
speech telling people, “This is who I am, this is why I’m running.” It seems
pretty simple. I felt so sick, so sick leading up to that. I was standing
outside that cafeteria door. They had all these candidates sweating beyond
belief as they went through.
I had borrowed my mom’s dress to wear to this. And I don’t remember anything
that I said, to be honest, but I did not walk out–I did what I had to do–I did
not walk out of there thinking like, “Easy, I got this.”
It took years of knocking on doors and experiencing those nerves,
experiencing that fear, that anxiety, that insecurity, not once, not twice, but
every single day as I knocked on thousands of doors in that district every
single day. And after each conversation, realizing, “Oh God, that was so nice.
They were just such nice, nice people. What’s the problem?” And then all of the
anxiety comes back in, like, “Oh, the next one’s gonna be the tough one,” then
the next one, then the next one. And ultimately, I had to confront this because
it was not productive, and I had to figure out a way through it.
And I definitely, you know, learned the hard way. But I had to ask myself
like, “What’s your problem? What are you so afraid of? Why is this causing you
so much anxiety?” And what I realized was that all of my fears and anxiety were
ultimately coming from a pretty selfish place of like, “What if I look stupid?
What if they ask me a question I don’t know the answer to? What if I don’t say
the right words?”
But in all of my own responses to that, it was all about I, I, I. That word
was repeating itself way too much, especially given what I was there to do. And
my mission was, “How can I serve you? What can I do for you and your family?
Tell me about your concerns.” And so when I talk about a spiritual foundation,
for me, that was a spiritual realization that my aim and my goal and my purpose
is to try to be of service to God, and how best to serve God than to be of
service to God’s children.
And to try to make that positive impact. And it changed everything for me
from where I used to walk into a room like this, just like, “Nobody talk to me.
I’m just gonna stand in the corner and, you know, do what I gotta do, and then
I’m gonna leave.” But instead of that, being able to walk into a room like this
and recognize like, “Hey, I have the opportunity to share a kind word, to share
respect, to share thanks, to maybe share a story that might encourage someone
else,” and see what can I offer and how can I make a positive impact, even if
I’m only having an interaction with someone for 30 seconds, that could be the
thing that changes that person’s outlook or causes them to ask a question or
may have that positive impact. And that, to me, is really collectively, yes,
what IWF is about and has been making a positive impact for so long in this
country. Yes, for women and girls, but we can’t talk about women and girls
without talking about our husbands and our fathers and our brothers and our
society as a whole.
And so I’ve personally gone through my own journey and learned the hard way
and run into a bunch of brick walls. But I’m grateful for IWF because I didn’t
have a group of supporters and mentors and those who were out doing the tough
work and having the tough conversations on the TV when I was learning and
figuring out how can I best serve.
So all of that is really just to say, I’m grateful to be here and really
grateful for the work that IWF does and the support that they are getting from
all of you, however you are contributing to this cause. We face some of the
greatest challenges right now to the fundamental fabric of our country. And it
is up to every single one of us as citizens of this great country to be the one
who steps up and says, “Here I am, send me,” and every day asking, “Okay, I’m
doing things I didn’t think I would do. What more can I do? How can I best
serve? How can I make a greater impact?”
And we are making that impact, whether it be individually but certainly
collectively. We’ve seen the power of change when enough patriots, leaders, and
citizens who care stand up for what is right. Stand up for common sense, stand
up for the truth, and stand up for those fundamental principles that make this
country the great country that it is, those principles enshrined in our
Constitution as they are being challenged every single day.
Thank you all so much for the opportunity to be here and share this time
with you. Thank you.” [SOURCE LINK]
