In January 2017, Gabbard traveled to Syria to meet with Syrian dictator Bashar Al-Assad. After her return, her disclosures to the House Ethics Committee failed to disclose the source of her funding for the trip along with the fact that she had a second meeting with Al-Assad. Her final itinerary was markedly different from the version approved by the Ethics Committee, which listed no meetings with any Syrian officials or politicians.

• Between 2017 and 2019, Gabbard failed to disclose her involvement with the Center for the Study of Statesmanship, a think tank based at the Catholic University of America in Washington D.C. supported by funding from organizations in the Koch network.
  

In 2022, Gabbard established a nonprofit named We Must Protect, a disaster relief nonprofit that claimed to spend "every dollar" on supporting victims of fire. 

• We Must Protect’s 2023 tax return shows that it paid out only $50.05k in grants that year despite receiving an overall $127.91k in contributions. It ended the year with $60.34k remaining in the bank with an additional $11.5k in payments to independent contractors.
  

Gabbard frequently creates PACs, even when not running for office. Currently, Gabbard controls three PACs that have reported expenditures to MAGA-aligned Republicans and to cover her own personal expenses: For Love of Country, Inc.; Defend Freedom Inc.; and Our Freedom, Our Future.

• In November 2024, the treasurer of For Love of Country, Inc. received a letter from the Federal Elections Commission notifying him that the PAC had placed $151,000 in donations into the wrong account.
  

While in Congress, Gabbard received 238k from defense interests, including at least one company that has a contract with the Department of National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which she would oversee as Director of National Intelligence.