6 names on Donald Trump's VP shortlist
Tulsi Gabbard
Tulsi Gabbard, 41, was the first Hindu member of Congress when she served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2013-2020, representing Hawaii's 2nd Congressional District as a Democrat. She retired to run for president in the 2020 presidential election. Gabbard made opposition to foreign wars a central part of her campaign and has since emerged as a staunch critic of the Democrat Party.
Gabbard formally left the party in 2022 but stopped short of switching to the Republican Party. She claims her former party had become "an elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness, who divide us by racializing every issue & stoke anti-white racism."
Gabbard also maintained that Democrats "actively work to undermine our God-given freedoms, are hostile to people of faith & spirituality, demonize the police & protect criminals at the expense of law-abiding Americans, believe in open borders, weaponize the national security state to go after political opponents, and above all, dragging us ever closer to nuclear war."
Last year, Gabbard gave a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference urging Americans to "recognize each other as children of God." She also identified the belief that "No government, no person, no individual has the right to take away the freedom that God has given us" as the "foundation of the social construct that is the United States of America" and "the core of who we are as Americans."
Even before officially leaving the Democrat Party, Gabbard worked to distinguish herself from national Democrats by introducing a bill to ban trans-identified males from women's sports in the final days of the 116th U.S. Congress that concluded in 2020.
However, Gabbard expressed support for codifying the U.S. Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide into federal law as a presidential candidate and also signaled support for repealing the Hyde Amendment that prevents U.S. taxpayer dollars from funding abortions.
If selected as Trump's running mate and elected vice president, Gabbard would become the first Hindu to serve in that position.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: [email protected]