President Donald Trump’s announcement Tuesday that Bill Pulte will serve as acting Director of National Intelligence—taking over the post from the embattled Tulsi Gabbard—makes a weird kind of sense.

Pulte, who currently serves as head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has no experience that prepares him to oversee the 18 intelligence agencies that the DNI is supposed to manage. But he has used his traditionally low-profile job overseeing the home mortgage industry to help launch dubious criminal probes relating to supposed mortgage fraud by Trump critics and foes. Working closely with Ed Martin, the former head of the Trump DOJ’s “weaponization” task force, Pulte spurred investigations of Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), former Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), and Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, as well as an ill-fated indictment of New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Gabbard, who left the DNI job last month, was largely sidelined from intelligence matter as Trump launched attacks against........

© Mother Jones