Tulsi Gabbard's political evolution | TIME

TUlsi Gabbard, a former Democratic presidential candidate who turned independent, announced Tuesday at a Donald Trump rally in North Carolina that she is officially joining the Republican Party.

“I join the party of the people, the party of equality, the party founded to fight and end slavery in this country. It is the party of common sense and the party led by a president who has the courage and strength to fight for peace,” Gabbard said. “You know, I was a Democrat for over 20 years. “Today’s Democratic Party is completely unrecognizable,” she continued. “If you look at Kamala Harris’ party, for example, it is anti-freedom. She is for censorship, she is for open borders and she is for war, without even appearing to care about peace.”

Gabbard, 43, becoming a Republican should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed her career, particularly in recent years, as the former Hawaii congresswoman has long made a name for herself by openly criticizing Democrats and becoming one President Trump has become a staunch supporter of the former party.

Her announcement of her party switch comes after prominent Republicans such as former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter, former House Republican Conference Chairwoman Liz Cheney, endorsed Harris in the 2024 election. Gabbard cited the Cheneys' support of Harris as evidence that the Democratic Party is a “warmonger.”

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The daughter of educators and small business owners involved in local politics, Gabbard began her political career in 2002 when she represented West Oahu's District 42 as a Democrat and became the youngest person ever elected to the Hawaii state legislature . She left politics in 2004 to serve in the Army National Guard before returning after tours in Iraq and Kuwait to run for Honolulu City Council and win the election in 2010.

When Gabbard threw her hat into the ring in the 2011 Democratic primary for Hawaii's second district congressional seat, she was still a relative unknown and an outsider. But after defeating five other challengers, including the former mayor of Honolulu – in a campaign largely marked by her vocal opposition to the Bush administration's foreign wars and her personal repudiation of same-sex marriage, which she previously opposed, she now now but had supported – Gabbard quickly emerged as the Democratic Party's “rising star,” as former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called her. Then-President Barack Obama supported her candidacy for Congress and she was invited to speak at the 2012 Democratic National Convention.

After being elected to Congress in 2012 as the first Hindu, first American Samoan and – alongside Tammy Duckworth of Illinois – the first female combat veteran, Gabbard quickly rose in the party and was elected vice chair of the DNC in 2013.

But Gabbard, known for her populist economic policies and her pro-veterans yet anti-interventionist policies, certainly didn't toe the party line. She often clashed with Democratic leadership for publicly criticizing Obama's foreign policy, and during the 2016 presidential election she criticized the DNC's primary process as biased in favor of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. In 2016, she resigned as vice chair of the DNC to support the campaign of independent Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, for whom she became a prominent supporter and delivered the nomination speech at the 2016 Democratic National Convention.

After Trump won the 2016 general election, Gabbard said she had an “open and positive” meeting with the president-elect and was rumored to be being considered for a Cabinet post.

In 2019, Gabbard launched a presidential campaign and announced that she would not seek re-election to Congress. But especially after she voted “present” in Trump’s first impeachment trial, she became the “least popular” candidate in the sprawling Democratic primary campaign. One of the standout moments of her short-lived campaign came during a primary debate in which she questioned then-California Sen. Kamala Harris' record as a prosecutor. But that wasn't enough to propel her candidacy, which never polled above single digits and was suspended in March 2020, after which she endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden. She was not invited to speak at the 2020 Democratic National Convention.

After leaving office in 2021, Gabbard became an even more outspoken critic of the Democratic Party, appearing often on Fox News and even serving as a guest host for Tucker Carlson's show on multiple occasions. She expressed her support for Republican candidates and their policies and spoke at the 2022 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). In October 2022, she announced that she was officially resigning from the Democratic Party, which she described as “under the complete control of an elite Cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly vigilance.” She continued to support a number of GOP candidates for the 2022 midterm elections, including Trump's current nominee, Ohio Sen. JD Vance.

Gabbard was speculated to be a potential candidate to replace Trump earlier this year, and when asked about it on Fox News in March, she said, “It would be an honor to serve our country in this way and be a part of it.” “Position to help President Trump.” After formally endorsing Trump in August, Gabbard was tapped to co-lead Trump's transition team, along with former independent candidate and Trump supporter Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who will set priorities for would determine his new government if elected in November.

When Trump took the stage after Gabbard announced her new GOP membership on Tuesday, he called it a “great honor” and exclaimed, “Wow, that was a surprise.”