Tulsi Gabbard Sends Criminal Referrals to DOJ Over Trump Impeachment Fight
April 15, 2026, 10: 41 PM ET — tulsi gabbard has asked the Justice Department to investigate two former government officials tied to President Donald Trump’s first impeachment inquiry. A spokesperson for her office confirmed the criminal referrals but did not identify the specific crimes alleged. The decision on whether to open a criminal investigation now rests with federal prosecutors.
Referral lands at the Justice Department
The move follows Gabbard’s criticism earlier this week of how former Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson handled the 2019 whistleblower complaint, along with her release of documents linked to Atkinson. The whistleblower had raised an “urgent concern” over Trump’s request that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy investigate former Vice President Joe Biden.
That complaint also raised concerns about the handling of records from a Trump-Zelenskyy phone call and about the role of Trump’s then-personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, in the United States’ relationship with Ukraine. In the complaint, the whistleblower wrote that the President was using the power of his office to seek interference from a foreign country in the 2020 election. The referral does not, on the face of the released documents, provide direct evidence of criminal wrongdoing.
Tulsi Gabbard revives a familiar political battle
Trump was impeached in the House in late 2019 and later acquitted in the Senate in early 2020 in a largely party-line vote. He has long denied wrongdoing and described his call with Zelenskyy as “perfect. ” The new referrals place tulsi gabbard at the center of another effort to relitigate the first-term fight over impeachment and intelligence oversight.
Gabbard has said the intelligence community “concocted a false narrative” that Congress used to impeach Trump in 2019, and she argued that Atkinson relied on “second-hand evidence” in examining the complaint. Atkinson, who was fired by Trump in 2020, said after his removal that he had faithfully discharged his duties and served without regard to partisan favor or political fear.
Immediate reactions and next steps
Atkinson and the Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The whistleblower’s identity has not been formally disclosed, and the Justice Department has not said whether it will pursue the matter further. For now, tulsi gabbard’s referrals add fresh pressure to a dispute that has already returned to the center of Washington’s political and legal conversation.
The referrals also come after Gabbard’s office last year released files tied to the intelligence community’s review of Russian interference in the 2016 election, claiming they showed a “treasonous conspiracy” by Biden-era officials. Some figures from that broader investigation, including former CIA Director John Brennan, have since been subpoenaed in a federal probe in Florida, though no charges have been filed. That wider backdrop underscores how tulsi gabbard is pushing to reopen some of the most contentious intelligence and impeachment fights of Trump’s first term.
What happens next depends on whether prosecutors decide the referrals merit a criminal investigation. Until then, the case remains a political flashpoint with major consequences still uncertain, and tulsi gabbard is signaling that she intends to keep pressing the issue.
Quick context
The 2019 whistleblower complaint became a central part of Trump’s first impeachment inquiry after concerns about Ukraine surfaced. Gabbard’s latest move turns that old conflict into a new Justice Department question.
