In the second surprise cabinet announcement to break on Tuesday, President-elect Donald Trump announced he was picking military veteran and Fox News analyst Pete Hegseth as his nominee for secretary of Defense.
“Pete is tough, smart and a true believer in America First,” Trump said in a statement, according to Reuters.
“With Pete at the helm, America’s enemies are on notice – Our Military will be Great Again, and America will Never Back Down.”
Hegseth was the second surprise of the day, after South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem was reported to be the nominee to head the Department of Homeland Security in the early hours of Tuesday.
However, unlike Noem — who has experience in government, if perhaps not in homeland security — Hegseth has not had government experience.
A graduate of Princeton University with a masters from Harvard, Hegseth was a platoon leader at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base before seeing duty in Iraq.
In addition to having led both the Concerned Veterans of America and Vets for Freedom, he’s also done work at two conservative think-tanks, the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research and the Center of the American Experiment, Roll Call reported.
However, Hegseth is probably best known for his commentary on Fox News — which likely had more than a little to do with securing the nomination.
As Reuters noted, Hegseth “has expressed disdain for the so-called ‘woke’ policies of Pentagon leaders including its top military officer.”
Do you like Pete Hegseth?
The only Defense secretary under the Biden administration, Lloyd Austin, wasn’t an especially endearing fellow to the right, although his policies seemed to jibe well with gender studies majors whose combat experience was mostly confined to fighting incorrect pronoun usage on Discord servers.
Austin was behind the DEI-ification of the military and spearheaded a mostly fruitless investigation to root out “domestic extremism” in the Armed Forces; he was given to inadvertently hilarious statements like thanking “LGBTQ+ citizens” for their role in fighting and winning, among other things, the American Revolution and Civil War.
Not only that, the selection of Hegseth “could also set up a collision course between Hegseth and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, a former fighter pilot with command experience in the Pacific and the Middle East, who Hegseth accused of ‘pursuing the radical positions of left-wing politicians,’” Reuters reported.
Furthermore, Hegseth has also written about the need to revamp the military to do away with woke officials who view the armed forces as a social experiement.
“The next president of the United States needs to radically overhaul Pentagon senior leadership to make us ready to defend our nation and defeat our enemies. Lots of people need to be fired,” Hegseth wrote in his book “The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free.”
The book also made it clear that he expects NATO countries to live up to their treaty obligations by spending more on common defense.
“Outdated, outgunned, invaded, and impotent. Why should America, the European ’emergency contact number’ for the past century, listen to selfrighteous and impotent nations asking us to honor outdated and one-sided defense arrangements they no longer live up to?” Hegseth wrote.
“Maybe if NATO countries actually ponied up for their own defense — but they don’t. They just yell about the rules while gutting their militaries and yelling at America for help.”
He’s also argued that getting dug in with Ukraine risks a larger war.
“If Ukraine can defend themselves… great, but I don’t want American intervention driving deep into Europe and making [Putin] feel like he’s so much on his heels,” Hegseth said in a podcast appearance.
Suffice it to say, prominent Democrats immediately zeroed in on Hegseth as a nominee they’d do their best to challenge.
A Fox & Friends weekend co-host is not qualified to be the Secretary of Defense.
I lead the Senate military personnel panel. All three of my brothers served in uniform. I respect every one of our servicemembers.
Donald Trump’s pick will make us less safe and must be rejected. https://t.co/6ADUJSm8x6
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) November 13, 2024
“A Fox & Friends weekend co-host is not qualified to be the Secretary of Defense,” Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren wrote.
“I lead the Senate military personnel panel. All three of my brothers served in uniform. I respect every one of our servicemembers. Donald Trump’s pick will make us less safe and must be rejected.”
However, as an outsider — and an anti-woke one at that — Hegseth stands to pick up significant GOP support, despite the unorthodox nomination. Whether that’s enough to get him confirmed, however, remains to be seen.
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