Ex-US intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard guided by Hawaii Krishna guru, investigation reveals

The Washington Post published a major investigation revealing that former US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who resigned on June 19, 2026, may have received secret political guidance from Chris Butler, the leader of the Hawaii-based Krishna religious community where she grew up. Thousands of pages of documents show anonymous advisers directing her congressional speeches, legislation, and tweets, with analysts matching her words almost verbatim to the notes in 24 out of 32 televised interviews.

Former US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard resigned on June 19, 2026, ending a turbulent 15-month tenure overseeing America's 18 intelligence agencies. Two days later, The Washington Post published a bombshell investigation suggesting that throughout her political career, Gabbard may have been secretly guided by Chris Butler, the leader of a Hawaii-based Krishna religious community in which she was raised.

From Hawaii to Washington

Gabbard was born in American Samoa and moved to Hawaii at age two with her parents, who were followers of Butler's religious organisation, the Science of Identity Foundation (SIF), founded in the 1970s. SIF members worship Krishna as the supreme deity and practice yoga, meditation, and vegetarianism. Some former members have described the group as a cult, a characterisation that the organisation itself rejects.

Butler held strong political views, arguing that incompetent leaders should be replaced by "holy people", and his followers, including Gabbard's parents, were active participants in Hawaiian political life. Gabbard herself was elected to Hawaii's state legislature in 2002 at the age of 21, becoming its youngest-ever member. She later served two tours in the Middle East with the National Guard before becoming in 2012 the first American of Samoan descent and first Hindu woman elected to the US Congress, where she was sworn in on the Bhagavad Gita.

Anonymous notes, near-verbatim speeches

The investigation was made possible by Rebecca Salzburg, a former SIF member who assisted Gabbard during her congressional campaigns. Salzburg handed The Washington Post 25,000 pages of emails, letters, and social media records, including hundreds of anonymous advisory notes addressed to people in Gabbard's inner circle, including her parents, covering the period from 2011 to 2017.

The notes directed Gabbard on an extraordinarily wide range of matters: which legislation to introduce, which specific words to use publicly, and even what to post on Twitter. Post journalists analysed 32 televised interviews Gabbard gave between 2014 and 2016, comparing her statements against the adviser's pre-interview talking points. In 24 of the 32 cases, Gabbard used the adviser's formulations almost word for word. In the remaining eight, she advanced his ideas in her own words.

The anonymous adviser's tone toward Gabbard was at times brutally critical. He reportedly called her a "coward" and "wishy-washy" for certain political comments, mocked what he described as her wide-eyed public speaking style, and assessed one of her comments on an Obama address to Congress with the blunt verdict: «You're not even trying. You've become truly lazy intellectually.»

Salzburg told the Post that only Butler could have spoken to Gabbard in such terms. She said he deliberately concealed his identity, advising Gabbard either directly by phone or through intermediaries who transcribed his remarks and forwarded them to Gabbard's circle. The documents also suggest that people connected to Butler ran a small network of online accounts that posted supportive comments about Gabbard on social media and news websites for years, with some of those comments appearing even after her recent resignation.

Downfall in the Trump administration

SIF representatives did not deny the authenticity of the documents, but insisted Butler did not write the notes and questioned Salzburg's credibility, pointing to a conflict that led to her departure from the group. Gabbard's office declined to comment, calling the article an "implausible, bigoted" attack on her faith.

Gabbard's time as Director of National Intelligence was defined primarily by politically motivated actions in support of Donald Trump's agenda: firing officials who could impede mass deportations, ordering a search of an election centre in Georgia as part of investigations into alleged 2020 election fraud, and dismissing findings of Russian interference in the 2016 election as a «treasonous conspiracy» by Barack Obama.

Despite her loyalty, Gabbard never gained entry to Trump's inner circle. The decisive break came after the US struck Iranian nuclear facilities in the summer of 2025, an operation for which she was reportedly not consulted. White House insiders reportedly joked that her title, DNI, stood for «Do Not Invite». The White House is said to have pressured her to resign, though the departure was publicly framed as her own decision, citing her husband's cancer diagnosis. She had planned to leave at the end of June, but according to Axios, on June 9 she received a call from acting DNI Bill Pulte informing her that day was her last. Her formal resignation date was subsequently set as June 19.