By Jonathan Landay
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Wednesday announced the first major overhaul of her office since its creation, slashing personnel by more than 40% by October 1 and saving more than $700 million per year.
Among other changes, the restructuring eliminates the Foreign Malign Influence Center, which monitors foreign efforts to influence the American public. A fact sheet said that function was already performed by other U.S. intelligence units.
The Trump administration has sought to shrink the federal bureaucracy and has made sweeping cuts to a number of agencies.
Gabbard’s announcement also comes as she accuses former intelligence officials and others of involvement in what she says was a manufactured and politicized assessment that Russia sought to influence the 2016 presidential vote in U.S. President Donald Trump’s favor.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) played a key role in drafting those findings, which were confirmed by bipartisan Senate intelligence committee reports and a recent review ordered by CIA Director John Ratcliffe.
ODNI also oversaw assessments that Russia used online influence operations to try to sway the 2020 and 2024 presidential votes to Trump. Russia denies the allegations.
The office was created after the September 11, 2001, al Qaeda attacks on the U.S. to coordinate the work of the 18-agency U.S. intelligence community.
“Over the last 20 years, ODNI has become bloated and inefficient, and the intelligence community is rife with abuse of power, unauthorized leaks of classified intelligence, and politicized weaponization of intelligence,” Gabbard said in a statement.
The overhaul is required so ODNI can focus “on its core mission: find the truth and provide objective, unbiased, timely intelligence to the president and policymakers,” she said.
ODNI had about 1,800 employees when Gabbard took the helm, and she has already reduced staff by about 25 percent, according to the Federal News Network, which focuses on news about the federal workforce.
The additional 40% cut will save taxpayers more than $700 million a year beginning when fiscal 2025 ends on October 1, Gabbard said.
The ODNI fact sheet said Gabbard is also eliminating units that track weapons of mass destruction and cyber threats, saying that work, too, is performed by another intelligence unit. Eliminated as well is a group that produced long-range forecasts of global trends.
(Reporting by Jonathan Landay; Editing by Don Durfee and Tom Hogue)
