You remember what it was like being a rookie at work—how you dropped that whole tray of fries in front of your manager and accidentally locked yourself in the stock room?
Well, according to his old pals at Fox & Friends, that’s kind of like what Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is going through. Except, instead of, say, mixing together the wrong froyo flavors, he may have kind of, sort of texted sensitive military strike plans to people he wasn’t supposed to in unauthorized Signal group chats—twice.
On Tuesday morning, host Brian Kilmeade suggested that Hegseth’s reported use of a private Signal chat to communicate with his wife and others about plans for the March 15 bombing of Yemen might just “be part of a learning curve” for Hegseth. Kilmeade offered up this weak defense in light of The New York Times’ reporting Sunday that Hegseth shared details about the Yemeni strike in yet another Signal chat—this one, wholly separate from the one where he accidentally shared the same strike plans with an editor from The Atlantic.
In writing off Hegseth’s indiscretion as part of a “learning curve,” Kilmeade was obviously trying to cut Hegseth some slack. But it was also an unintentionally savage burn: One good reason not to put TV hosts in charge of the world’s largest military is because they don’t know what the hell they’re doing.
Hegseth joined his old colleagues Tuesday ostensibly to defend himself amid calls from even his inner circle that he be fired. But Hegseth instead spent his time blaming “left wing reporters” for spilling the beans about the original Signal chat and alleged leakers who have since been fired from the Pentagon for sharing details about the second. That Hegseth was himself the one who reportedly leaked the details of the military strike, both accidentally and intentionally, to people who had no business being privy to them, apparently wasn’t worth mentioning.
Hegseth also claimed to have been targeted by the Deep State within the Pentagon. “They’ve come after me from Day One,” he said, not mentioning that at least one of the officials who was fired, Dan Caldwell, was a longtime Hegseth aide who worked for him even before he became Secretary of Defense. All three of the fired officials have denied leaking and have said they still have not been told what they’re being investigated for.
Hegseth insisted the investigation was still ongoing. “Leaking is not okay in national security policy,” Hegseth told Kilmeade, “and we will stand behind that every day of the week.”
But Hegseth apparently didn’t grasp the irony in that statement. While Hegseth has maintained that nothing in his Signal chats was classified information, on Tuesday, NBC News reported that, in fact, the strike plan details that Hegseth shared on Signal were first sent to him by the head of U.S. Central Command via a secure government system. According to NBC, Hegseth then turned around and relayed that information in both Signal chats less than 10 minutes after he received it himself.
While President Trump has said publicly that Hegseth is “doing a great job,” NPR reported Monday that the White House is looking for possible replacements.
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