Tulsi Gabbard's Brother Arrested in Waikiki for Allegedly Luring Children

Tulsi Gabbard’s brother was arrested and charged over an incident in which police said he attempted to lure several children to his hotel room in Waikiki by offering them gum and money.

Batarti Gabbard, 55, was arrested after an incident on July 12, according to a press release from the Honolulu Police Department. He was positively identified several days later, according to the release; his family says he is undergoing psychiatric treatment.

“At about 2 p.m. on Sunday, July 12, 2026, an unknown man allegedly approached several children, including a 9-year-old boy, and offered them gum and money to accompany him to his hotel room. He also asked the children for their names and wrote them in a notebook. The children refused, and the man walked away,” read the police description of the events.

His sister Tulsi left the Trump administration in June, citing her husband’s cancer diagnosis as a reason. While in office, she was seen as taking a new political bent to her job when in January she personally oversaw an FBI raid of election offices in Fulton County, Georgia, where President Donald Trump sought to overturn the election results in 2024 and he subsequently faced criminal prosecution.

Gabbard’s father told Fox News that his son had agreed to abide by hospital protocol as he remains in custody.

"We love him, and asked him to follow the protocol at the hospital, which he says he will do," Mike Gabbard told Fox News Digital. "We're praying for his speedy recovery, and would appreciate the prayers of others."

The hunt for Gabbard’s replacement kicked off a political firestorm in D.C. Her former boss, determined to have a loyalist in the role, selected Bill Pulte for the job and placed him in an acting role after Gabbard’s departure.

But Pulte’s lack of any background in intelligence or national security, as well as his willingness to use his previous role at the Federal Housing Finance Agency to level accusations of mortgage fraud against Democratic politicians, has led to a jam on Capitol Hill as lawmakers have refused to confirm him to the role permanently.

Even in an acting role, Pulte has already made his mark on the office of the director of national intelligence. Dozens of staffers including some longtime professionals have been fired since he took over in June as MS NOW reported that Pulte was purging what he saw as those aligned with the “deep state”, alleging they withheld intelligence from superiors.

Gabbard’s final months in office also occurred as Trump was launching his war with Iran, the same kind of Middle East conflict Gabbard was known for vocally opposing when she was a Democratic member of Congress and afterwards as well.

She’d also publicly contradicted her boss’s stated reasoning for re-engaging the war: the supposed reconstitution of Iran’s nuclear program, which she testified under oath to Congress had not been rebuilt.

Trump was asked about her testimony during a press gaggle, and called her “wrong”. She subsequently took a backseat role on the issue of Iran as other members of the administration, including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, became the president’s public face i selling their efforts to achieve military objectives and end the war.

The former director of national intelligence has remained within Trump’s good graces upon leaving, however, and she has not suffered the kind of public ridicule some former members of his administration have faced — like Elon Musk, who led Trump’s “DOGE” efforts at the White House last year before suffering a nasty public breakup with the president.