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Secret Jared Kushner 'gossip' rocks Trump's inner circle as spies intercept high-stakes phone call
By ROSS IBBETSON, ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Published: 18:37 EST, 12 February 2026 | Updated: 21:27 EST, 12 February 2026

Jared Kushner is at the center of a highly classified whistleblower complaint against Tulsi Gabbard, an explosive new report has revealed.

Donald Trump's son-in-law featured in a conversation about Iran between two foreign nationals, The New York Times reported on Thursday.

The phone call between the pair was intercepted by a foreign intelligence agency and handed to the US last May.

The exact contents of the call remain unclear but include allegations about Kushner that would be 'significant if verified,' sources said.

A senior US official told the Daily Mail that the claims 'were nothing more than salacious gossip.'

A whistleblower accused Director of National Intelligence Gabbard of restricting access to the intercepted phone call for political reasons, according to the complaint filed last May.

Kushner's previously unreported involvement deepens the mystery surrounding the complaint which was deemed so sensitive that it was kept in a locked safe for eight months.

The timing could not be more fraught. Kushner, Trump's Middle East envoy, is currently leading high-stakes negotiations with Iran to end its nuclear enrichment program. The 45-year-old real-estate investor also maintains business interests in the region.

Members of Congress were finally briefed last week about the complaint which was made as Trump planned Operation Midnight Hammer, the bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities at the end of June.

Kushner's name was redacted in the original report made by the National Security Agency (NSA), but those reading it - including the whistleblower - were able to understand that it referred him.

Kushner was discussed as pertained to his influence within the Trump administration, those familiar with the contents of the conversation told the Times.

The intercepted phone call included allegations about Kushner that were not supported by any evidence, the intelligence sources said.

Officials refused to divulge the contents of the intercept on the grounds it would expose the top secret source of the intelligence.

Intercepts of this type are notoriously difficult for spies to interpret without more concrete information which can be provided by documents or agents on the ground.

The whistleblower believed that the information should be disseminated more broadly but Gabbard - along with the NSA's top lawyer and the intelligence community's inspector general - disagreed.

The complaint's existence was first revealed last week, with the Wall Street Journal likening it to 'a cloak-and-dagger mystery reminiscent of a John le Carré novel.'

A heavily-redacted version of the complaint was reviewed on a 'read-and-return' basis by the Gang of Eight last Tuesday - a select bipartisan group of lawmakers who are briefed on classified intelligence matters by the executive branch.

Inspector General Christopher Fox told lawmakers in a letter approved for public release that the complaint was 'administratively closed' by his predecessor in June and no further action was taken.

'If the same or similar matter came before me today, I would likely determine that the allegations do not meet the statutory definition of "urgent concern,"' Fox wrote.

Fox, an ex-Gabbard aide who took over as IG after Trump purged Joe Biden's watchdogs, briefed Congress after receiving final approval from the DNI.

Fox said in the letter that the complaint was tied up for months while his office sought legal clearance to view the classified complaint.

He cited the 'complexity of the classification', a 43-day government shutdown that started in October and leadership changes at DNI.

Fox's predecessor Tamara Johnson, a career civil servant, had determined at the time of the initial complaint that the allegation met the legal threshold of 'urgent concern' if true.

But three days later, after receiving new information Johnson wrote another memo which concluded the whistleblower's complaint was not credible.

A Gabbard spokeswoman last week dismissed the 'baseless' complaint and denied stonewalling the whistleblower.

DNI spokeswoman Olivia Coleman said: 'This is a classic case of a politically motivated individual weaponizing their position in the Intelligence Community, submitting a baseless complaint and then burying it in highly classified information to create false intrigue, a manufactured narrative, and conditions which make it substantially more difficult to produce 'security guidance' for transmittal to Congress.'

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... -call.html

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Whistle-Blower Report Involved Intelligence About a Trump Contact
Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, moved to lock down an intelligence intercept that referred to someone close to President Trump, the report said.

By Julian E. Barnes

Reporting from Washington
Feb. 7, 2026

Members of Congress were briefed this week on a whistle-blower report about an intelligence intercept of a call between two foreign nationals discussing a person close to President Trump, according to people familiar with the material.

It is not clear what country the two foreign nationals were from, but the discussion involved Iran. The whistle-blower report was drafted last May, around the time the Trump administration was deliberating about a strike on Iran. Mr. Trump ordered a military attack on Iranian nuclear facilities in June.

The identity of the person close to Mr. Trump could not be immediately determined, nor could the content of what the two foreign nationals were saying about the person.

The existence of the whistle-blower report, which came to light after a Wall Street Journal report, has led to debate on Capitol Hill about the significance of the report as well as the underlying intelligence.

The whistle-blower accused Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, of limiting who could see the report and of blocking wider distribution among the nation’s spy agencies, according to people familiar with the complaint.

People who have reviewed the whistle-blower report have differed about the importance of the underlying intelligence, which was collected by the National Security Agency.

The people interviewed for this story spoke on the condition that their names not be disclosed because much of the intelligence around the whistle-blower complaint remains classified.

One official said there was no other intelligence that led officials to think the two officials had been speaking truthfully. Some intelligence analysts concluded the two foreign nationals were either gossiping or deliberately spreading disinformation.

As a result of those doubts, Ms. Gabbard moved to restrict the report’s visibility. She also provided the information to Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff, according to people briefed on the events.

The acting intelligence community’s inspector general cleared Ms. Gabbard of wrongdoing after she responded to questions about her actions.

It is not clear when the inspector general cleared Ms. Gabbard. But inspectors general are typically supposed to make a determination about a whistle-blower complaint within two weeks.

And some people, including administration critics, who have reviewed the report and have considered the underlying intelligence to be significant, agreed that Ms. Gabbard did not act improperly by restricting distribution of the report.

While inspectors general are required to notify Congress only about complaints they find credible, some of the administration critics said Ms. Gabbard erred in not alerting the congressional intelligence committees or members of congressional leadership about the whistle-blower report or the underlying intelligence soon after it was lodged.

Congressional officials learned about the complaint, but not its contents, when Andrew Bakaj, a lawyer for the whistle-blower, sent a letter to the intelligence committees in November.

The Guardian earlier reported that the intelligence involved an intercept by the National Security Agency.

Congressional leaders have been pushing the N.S.A. and Ms. Gabbard’s office to provide them a copy of the underlying intelligence report so that oversight committees could review it. A heavily redacted copy of the inspector general’s report was provided to Congress.

Julian E. Barnes covers the U.S. intelligence agencies and international security matters for The Times. He has written about security issues for more than two decades.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/07/us/p ... trump.html

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NSA detected foreign intelligence phone call about a person close to Trump
Whistleblower says that Tulsi Gabbard blocked agency from sharing report and delivered it to White House chief of staff

Cate Brown
Sat 7 Feb 2026 23.54 EST

Last spring, the National Security Agency (NSA) flagged an unusual phone call between two members of foreign intelligence, who discussed a person close to Donald Trump, according to a whistleblower’s attorney who was briefed on details of the call.

The highly sensitive communique, which has roiled Washington over the past week, was brought to the attention of the director of national intelligence (DNI), Tulsi Gabbard.

But rather than allowing NSA officials to distribute the information further, Gabbard took a paper copy of the intelligence directly to the president’s chief of staff, Susie Wiles, according to the whistleblower’s attorney, Andrew Bakaj.

One day after meeting Wiles, Gabbard told the NSA not to publish the intelligence report. Instead, she instructed NSA officials to transmit the highly classified details directly to her office, Bakaj said.

Details of this exchange between Gabbard and the NSA were shared directly with the Guardian and have not been previously reported. Nor has Wiles’s receipt of the intelligence report.

On 17 April, a whistleblower contacted the office of the inspector general alleging that Gabbard had blocked highly classified intelligence from routine dispatch, according to Bakaj, who has been briefed on details surrounding the highly sensitive phone call flagged by the NSA. The whistleblower filed a formal complaint about Gabbard’s actions on 21 May, Bakaj said.

The Guardian reported earlier on Saturday that the phone conversation was between a person associated with foreign intelligence and a person close to Trump, based on Bakaj’s recollection of the complaint, which he confirmed over multiple calls. However, after publication, Bakaj said he misspoke.

He clarified his understanding of the complaint in a statement: “The NSA picked up a phone call between two members of foreign intelligence involving someone close to the Trump White House,” he said. “The NSA does not monitor individuals without a reason.”

The person close to Trump is not understood to be an administration official or a special government employee, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Bakaj said that members of the intelligence community are often referred to him for legal counsel because of his background and expertise. He previously served in the office of the inspector general for the CIA.

A press secretary for the office of the director of national intelligence (ODNI) said to the Guardian in a statement: “This story is false. Every single action taken by DNI Gabbard was fully within her legal and statutory authority, and these politically motivated attempts to manipulate highly classified information undermine the essential national security work being done by great Americans in the Intelligence Community every day.”

“This is yet another attempt to distract from the fact that both a Biden-era and Trump-appointed Intelligence Community Inspector General already found the allegations against DNI Gabbard baseless,” the statement said.

For eight months, the intelligence report has been kept under lock and key, even after the whistleblower pushed to disclose details to congressional intelligence committees.

Acting inspector general Tamara A Johnson dismissed the complaint at the end of a 14-day review period, writing in a 6 June letter addressed to the whistleblower that “the Inspector General could not determine if the allegations appear credible”.

The letter stipulated that the whistleblower could take their concerns to Congress, only after receiving DNI guidance on how to proceed, given the highly sensitive nature of the complaint.

The independence of the watchdog’s office may be compromised, lawmakers have said, ever since Gabbard assigned one of her top advisers, Dennis Kirk, to work there on 9 May, two weeks after the whistleblower first made contact with the inspector general’s hotline.

Gabbard’s office issued its first public acknowledgment of the highly sensitive complaint in a letter addressed to lawmakers on Tuesday, one day after the Wall Street Journal reported on the classified brief. It was posted to the ODNI’s X account, including claims that the inspector general had not informed Gabbard of her obligations to transmit the complaint to Congress.

Bakaj said that the ODNI’s office cited various reasons for the delay in intelligence sharing, including the complaints’ top secret classification, the fall government shutdown and the intelligence community inspector general’s failure to notify Gabbard of her reporting requirements.

Two attorneys and two former intelligence professionals who reviewed details of the incident and ensuing complaint shared with the Guardian have identified what they believe are a series of procedural anomalies that raise questions about Gabbard’s handling of national intelligence and the whistleblower disclosure, which was reported to the inspector general as a matter of “urgent concern”.

Members of the “gang of eight”, a group of Senate and House leaders privy to classified information from the executive branch, received a heavily redacted version for review on Tuesday night. They have disagreed about the legality of Gabbard’s conduct, as well as the credibility of the whistleblower complaint.

Two Republican lawmakers dismissed its credibility and backed Gabbard’s conduct, including the Arkansas senator Tom Cotton, who said in a statement on X that “the DNI took the necessary steps to ensure the material has handled and transmitted appropriately in accordance with law”.

But Democrats have raised questions about the delay. “The law is clear: when a whistleblower makes a complaint and wants to get it before Congress the agency has 21 days to relay it,” said the senator Mark Warner of Virginia, the senior Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, in a Thursday press conference. “This whistleblower complaint was issued in May. We didn’t receive it until February.”

Warner said that the months-long delay reflected an effort to “bury the complaint”.

The contents of the whistleblower complaint are still largely unknown. Bakaj, the whistleblower’s attorney, said that Gabbard’s office had redacted much of the complaint that was released to intelligence committee members on Tuesday, citing executive privilege.

“I don’t know the contents of the complaint, but by exercising executive privilege they are flagging that it involves presidential action,” he said.

On 3 February, Bakaj again requested guidance from Gabbard’s office about how to share the whistleblower’s full report while taking appropriate precautions.

“As you are well aware, our client’s disclosure directly impacts our national security and the American people,” Bakaj wrote. “This means that our client’s complete whistleblower disclosure must be transmitted to Congress, and that we, as their counsel, speak with members and cleared staff.”

Bakaj said that the DNI’s office did not respond to his letter by its Friday deadline. He plans to contact members of the Senate and House intelligence committees on Monday to schedule an unclassified briefing on Gabbard’s conduct and the “underlying intelligence concerns”.

Members of the gang of eight have contacted the NSA to request the underlying intelligence that the whistleblower says Gabbard blocked, according to staff in Warner’s office.

Lawmakers can make routine requests for classified information directly from intelligence agencies such as the NSA. The request circumvents the ODNI’s involvement, as well as the office of the inspector general.

The leading Democrat on the House oversight committee, Stephen F Lynch, wrote a letter to acting inspector general Johnson to warn her that the integrity of the watchdog office could be compromised by Kirk’s May appointment to the group.

Kirk served in the first Trump administration and was a co-author of Project 2025, a policy roadmap for restructuring the federal government.

“The appointment of a highly partisan advocate for prioritizing personal loyalty to President Trump above independence and professionalism in the federal government – and one who apparently answers to DNI Gabbard rather than to you – in a senior role within [the intelligence community inspector general’s office] raises troubling questions about the independence of the IC IG,” Lynch wrote.

Johnson did not respond to a request for comment related to this story. She was replaced as the intelligence community inspector general in October by Christopher Fox.

This story was amended on 7 February 2026 to clarify that the phone call was between two people associated with foreign intelligence who discussed someone close to Donald Trump, not between someone and a person close to Trump. The earlier version was based on multiple phone calls with the whistleblower’s attorney, Andrew Bakaj, who later said he misspoke and clarified the actual details of the call.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... stleblower

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