Since the late 1990s, the U.S. intelligence community has published Global Trends, a public report that forecasts global and domestic challenges in the approaching decades. It includes threats like climate change and pandemics while also highlighting migration trends.
However, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard announced her office is scrapping the team that compiles the findings and the 2025 report itself.
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Former officials told The New York Times that some information in the report, specifically the threat of climate change, has become an obstacle to the Trump administration’s agenda and messaging in support of fossil fuels.
Gabbard accuses group of political agenda
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) asserts that the National Intelligence Council’s Strategic Futures Group, which compiles the report, “neglected to fulfill the purpose it was created for” and was compromised because of a partisan political motive.
“A draft of the 2025 Global Trends report was carefully reviewed by DNI Gabbard’s team and found to violate professional analytic tradecraft standards in an effort to propagate a political agenda that ran counter to all the current president’s national security priorities,” a statement from the office read.
Move comes amid a flurry of other announcements
News of the office’s shuttering last month was overshadowed by a series of other announcements. These include the shutdown of the National Intelligence University, which will be absorbed into the National Defense University, as well as cuts to officers investigating covert operations from foreign governments and threats to upcoming elections.
Gabbard’s team defended the move, accusing researchers of using improper methodology to compile information and analyze intelligence for the assessment.
Bringing it back may prove difficult
The assessment reportedly requires months of work by intelligence employees working under the previous administration. Historically, the group releases the report in the first months of a new administration. If a future presidential administration wishes to bring the group and report back, it could prove difficult, given the timeframe of installing a new team and compiling vast amounts of data.
Pushback against Gabbard’s claims
Former National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, who worked under former President Joe Biden, denied the Global Trends report ever pursued a political agenda. He said without the assessment, the U.S. may be unprepared for threats like climate change. He also criticized cuts and terminations of U.S. intelligence employees.
“To have the director of national security cast aspersions upon the professionalism and public service of dedicated people, I just find basically offensive and wrong,” Sullivan said, as reported by The Times.
