IC Workforce & Organization — 2026-07-03

Acting DNI Pulte Fires Dozens of Intelligence Officials Two Weeks Into Tenure Citing Deep State Concerns

BLUFPurging career analysts from an office that collects no intelligence itself degrades ODNI's capacity to coordinate and challenge the 18 agencies it exists to integrate.

Acting Director of National Intelligence Bill Pulte began terminating dozens of intelligence officials Thursday, according to an unnamed intelligence official who told MS NOW the removals target personnel Pulte's leadership believes are "deep state" . The intelligence official said leadership alleges the affected employees withheld complete intelligence pictures from superiors . The firings follow Pulte's removal last month of six political appointees who had served under former DNI Tulsi Gabbard . Four former senior intelligence officials told MS NOW they had never encountered instances of intelligence officers withholding information from superiors, and two noted that Pulte's office does not itself collect intelligence, receiving it instead from the CIA, NSA, DIA and 15 other agencies . The CIA did not respond to MS NOW's request for comment .

Analysis
Mass removal of career officers on an unsubstantiated "deep state" rationale strips ODNI of institutional knowledge exactly where the office depends entirely on other agencies for analytic input, since Pulte's staff collects nothing itself. Four former senior officials directly contradict the stated justification and can identify no specific instance of concealment, though sourcing rests on a single anonymous official with no corroborating outlet, leaving it unclassified and single-threaded. The purge follows last month's removal of Gabbard-era appointees, pointing to a broader consolidation of loyalists across ODNI leadership rather than an isolated action. Moderate confidence rests on the convergence of four former officials' accounts, with full scope unverified beyond initial reporting. The removals may instead reflect legitimate counterintelligence vetting against suspected leakers rather than an ideological purge, a possibility the anonymous sourcing cannot rule out.

1 sources

Acting DNI Bill Pulte begins firing dozens of intelligence officials - MS NOW