In his first week as the acting director of national intelligence, Bill Pulte, the highly controversial director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, did largely what his critics expected him to do.

Pulte, a shameless presidential sycophant who has weaponized mortgage fraud allegations against Donald Trump’s perceived political enemies, hit the ground running, firing intelligence officials, hiring a former Republican National Committee official with a background in elections issues to work as his chief of staff, and generally imposing “chaotic” new conditions inside the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

As his second week in office nears its end, Pulte’s powers appear to be expanding, despite — or perhaps because of — his inexperience and partisan antics.

During a brief Q&A with reporters Wednesday, the president said, “Bill is there just for a fairly short period of time, but while he’s there, I said, ‘You can declassify whatever you want.’”

Trump went on to say he encouraged the acting DNI to “do it fast,” adding, “I think that Bill will declassify.”

He didn’t elaborate as to what, exactly, Pulte might declassify, though NBC News reported earlier this week that the White House intends to declassify thousands of intelligence documents as part of the GOP’s broader effort to advance Trump’s conspiracy theories about his defeat in the 2020 election.

Relatedly, the president recently declared that he expects Pulte to use the office to perhaps “find out some things about the rigged elections,” reinforcing obvious concerns about the unqualified housing official playing the role of a partisan weapon in pursuit of Trump’s discredited ideas.

Time will tell what, if anything, Pulte declassifies, but the possibility of partisan recklessness has already sparked concern on Capitol Hill. Two weeks ago, Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, and Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, wrote to Pulte and specifically focused on this issue.

The Democratic lawmakers — the ranking members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, respectively — went on to remind the new acting DNI to follow “established policies and practices” and consult career intelligence officials before declassifying anything.

“Given the extremely sensitive nature of intelligence, we expect that you will not declassify properly classified information that would compromise intelligence sources and methods, or weaponize the declassification process for partisan political purposes,” they wrote.

Two weeks later, it’s difficult to have confidence that Pulte will follow the Democrats’ sensible advice.

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