WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday named an ally with no background in intelligence to oversee the nation’s spy agencies, taking the helm as the U.S. remains at war with Iran after a fresh round of peace talks stalled.
Bill Pulte is the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and in that position, he has helped the Trump administration compile information to fuel investigations into the president’s perceived political enemies.
As acting director of national intelligence, Pulte will be the highest-ranking intelligence official, overseeing a vast network of 18 agencies, including the CIA and the National Security Agency. He will also be the president’s principal adviser on intelligence issues and will manage the daily intelligence briefing for the president.
Trump announced on social media that Pulte will remain as director of the housing finance agency, as well as chairman of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, government-sponsored enterprises created by Congress to support the mortgage market.
With the appointment, the president is further shrinking his circle of top leadership. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also serves as national security adviser, Sean Duffy serves as transportation secretary and previously served as the acting administrator of NASA, and Todd Blanche is the acting attorney general and the acting librarian of Congress.
Trump announced the decision in a social media post, saying Pulte had “deep experience managing the most sensitive matters in America, the safety and soundness of the Markets, and over 10 Trillion Dollars at Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac, a substantial increase from where it was just 12 months ago.”
The director of national intelligence was created after 9/11 and is a Cabinet-level role that requires Senate confirmation, but naming Pulte in an acting capacity allows the president to bypass that process for now. It was not immediately clear if Pulte will be Trump’s permanent pick for the job.
Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, slammed the decision, saying in a statement that Pulte was not only unqualified, but that he was chosen “precisely because the White House believes he will provide the narrative it wants, not the intelligence we need,” Warner said.
Pulte was “chosen for his willingness to advance the president’s political agenda rather than his experience,” Warner said.
That should worry Americans, Warner said. “That is how intelligence becomes politicized, how inconvenient facts disappear, how agencies charged with protecting our democracy instead become tools to manipulate it, and how Americans are left more vulnerable to a terrorist attack,” Warner said.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said he had just heard about the decision.
“Trying to get more information about the current state of their thinking about that position, and again, if he’s somebody that wants that position permanently, he’s got, as you all know, a lengthy road ahead of him,” Thune said.
During Trump’s first term, the director of national intelligence position was filled on an acting basis for roughly nine months. Trump moved Joe Maguire, who was the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, into the role after his first director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, resigned.
Trump then tapped Richard Grenell, who had served as his ambassador to Germany, to serve in the job in an acting capacity. His selection of Grenell was criticized at the time because of his lack of experience in intelligence. He served about three months in the job before the Senate confirmed a permanent replacement, John Ratcliffe, who is currently director of the CIA.
Pulte will take over from Tulsi Gabbard, who announced she would step down at the end of the month because of her husband’s cancer diagnosis.
Gabbard, who has long portrayed herself as skeptical of U.S. military interventions abroad, has kept a low profile since the U.S. and Israel launched an air campaign against Iran on Feb. 28. At congressional hearings after the start of the war, Gabbard — unlike her counterpart at the CIA — declined to say whether she believed Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States, saying her role was merely to relay the best intelligence to the president.
Gabbard lacked major influence in the administration and was not part of Trump’s inner circle, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the situation. She also clashed with Ratcliffe, who has enjoyed a closer relationship with the president.
After Gabbard submitted her resignation on May 22, her deputy, Aaron Lukas, initially was named to serve as acting intelligence director. Lukas has extensive experience in the intelligence world, having worked as a CIA officer for years.
The Senate confirmed Pulte to the Federal Housing Finance Agency in March 2025. Three Democrats joined Republicans in supporting his nomination: Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland, Ruben Gallego of Arizona and Elissa Slotkin of Michigan.
In that role, Pulte has targeted Trump’s Democratic political enemies. In March, he made two criminal referrals against New York Attorney General Letitia James, alleging insurance fraud, several months after Trump’s Justice Department failed to prosecute her for a third time. James’ lawyer, Abbe D. Lowell, called the allegations “baseless.”
In May 2025, Pulte sent a criminal referral to the Justice Department for Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif. The probe into mortgage fraud allegations against Schiff, which he denied, ultimately stalled.
The handling of the Schiff investigation was reviewed by Justice Department prosecutors and the Government Accountability Office opened an investigation.
Christine Bish, a Republican operative who was subpoenaed in the Justice Department investigation, said she received a federal grand jury subpoena and was then repeatedly questioned by federal investigators about her ties to Pulte as well as Ed Martin, a Pulte associate who previously headed the “Weaponization Working Group” and now serves as pardon attorney.
Bish told NBC News in an interview in November that she received a message from Pulte asking for her cellphone number in July 2025, and then received a phone call from Pulte’s chief of staff about the Schiff investigation. She never spoke directly to Pulte, she said.
In September 2025, House Democrats asked an inspector general to investigate Pulte over mortgage fraud allegations he made against Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook, accusations she has denied.
Two months later, then-Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., sued Pulte, alleging that he used his position to “concoct fanciful allegations of mortgage fraud” against the congressman, who recently resigned from Congress following sexual misconduct allegations against him, which he also denied. Swalwell dropped the suit in March.
Pulte was also a driving force behind the controversy around the Federal Reserve headquarters renovation, which Trump has suggested has been mired with issues and has necessitated an investigation into then-Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.
Two previous reviews by the Fed’s independent inspector general, however, found no wrongdoing associated with the project. During Trump’s surprise tour of the construction site alongside Powell, Pulte was one of the few top allies who attended.
The Justice Department dropped the probe into Powell in April, though U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro left the door open to reopening the case.
