Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard delivered one of the most sobering speeches of Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest on Saturday, issuing a stark warning that she believes too many leaders have been unwilling to articulate plainly: Islamist ideology, she said, represents the greatest single threat to freedom and liberty in the modern world — and it is no longer confined to distant battlefields.
Gabbard did not mince words. Standing before a packed audience, she framed the issue not as a religious debate, but as a political and ideological conflict fundamentally at odds with the principles that underpin the United States. “There is a threat to our freedom that hasn’t been talked about enough,” she said, calling Islamist ideology both a near-term and long-term danger to American security and constitutional liberty. Where it takes hold, she warned, freedom rapidly disappears.
🚨 Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard warns that the greatest threat to freedom is Islamist ideology:
“It is a political ideology that seeks to create a global caliphate that governs us here in America”
She says it is already here and is happening in the U.S. pic.twitter.com/MDhQeB3nLH
— Ryan Saavedra (@RyanSaavedra) December 21, 2025
Central to Gabbard’s argument was the distinction between individual faith and political ideology. Islamist ideology, she explained, is not about personal belief but about governance — a system that seeks to impose a global caliphate through coercion, force, and the suppression of dissent.
Such an ideology, she argued, is irreconcilable with a constitutional system rooted in God-given, inalienable rights. “Their fundamental ideology is antithetical to the foundation that we find in our Constitution and Bill of Rights,” she said, emphasizing that America’s freedoms are not granted by the state, but endowed by a Creator.
Referencing the September 11 attacks, Gabbard reminded the audience that this threat is neither theoretical nor abstract. The willingness to use mass violence in service of ideological goals has already been demonstrated, and she cautioned against complacency born of time or distance. The danger, she said, lies not only in physical attacks, but in the gradual erosion of liberty wherever Islamist ideology gains political power.
Gabbard pointed to Europe as a warning sign. As Christmas approaches, she noted, German authorities have canceled Christmas markets due to terror threats — a visible example of how public life begins to retreat under ideological pressure. These are not isolated incidents, she suggested, but symptoms of a broader pattern in which societies begin to self-censor, restrict public expression, and surrender cultural traditions in the name of safety.
Throughout her remarks, Gabbard referenced the late Charlie Kirk, noting that he had frequently spoken about this threat because he understood its implications. A free society, she argued, cannot survive on denial or wishful thinking. It requires clarity, courage, and a willingness to defend foundational principles against ideologies that openly reject them.
Her conclusion was direct and uncompromising: freedom is not self-sustaining. It must be defended — intellectually, culturally, and politically — by a people who understand where their rights come from and why those rights matter. Without that resolve, Gabbard warned, even the strongest societies can lose their liberty far faster than they ever imagined.
