Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth might have accidentally sabotaged his own effort to punish a Democratic senator and retired Navy captain who appeared in a video urging military members to disobey illegal orders.
Hegseth has threatened to call Sen. Mark Kelly back to active service so he can be court-martialed for appearing in the video, which also featured five other Democratic members of Congress with military or intelligence experience.
Of the group, the Arizona senator achieved the highest rank and is the only one who served long enough to retire with a military pension, which means he must still follow the Uniform Code of Military Justice, or UCMJ.
Hegseth, a former Fox News host who served in the National Guard, has therefore zeroed in on Kelly, who served 25 years in the U.S. Navy and flew combat missions over Iraq before being chosen as a NASA space shuttle pilot. He retired as a captain in 2011.
The defense secretary wants to make an example of Kelly, sources told CNN. But by repeatedly accusing the senator of violating the UCMJ, Hegseth has likely kneecapped any potential military justice case against him, multiple legal experts said.
The secretary’s public statements are a clear case of “unlawful command influence,” in which a superior commander improperly influences or appears to influence the outcome of a military trial, making it impossible for the accused to receive a fair hearing, the legal experts said.
A superior commander making comments that imply they expect a certain result in a case is a textbook example of UCI, according to The Judge Advocate General’s School.
Given that everyone at the Defense Department works for Hegseth, his comments about Kelly make it nearly impossible for anyone below him to fairly convene a court to hear the case, sources told CNN.
A coalition of former and retired military judge advocates also issued a rare joint statement warning that recalling Kelly to face a court-martial would be partisan in nature, legally baseless, and compromised by unlawful command influence, the outlet reported.
The Defense Department declined to comment on CNN’s report or on Kelly’s case more broadly.
The defense secretary—who now styles himself as the “secretary of war”—has called the Democratic lawmakers the “Seditious Six” on social media and said Kelly’s conduct “brings discredit upon the armed forces and will be addressed appropriately.”
He has also suggested that Kelly’s comments violate several statutes of the UCMJ, even though Kelly and his fellow lawmakers were citing the uniform code in their Nov. 18 video.
In the video, the six Democrats address members of the military and intelligence communities directly, reminding them that they took an oath to uphold the Constitution and must refuse illegal orders.
Although the video didn’t give examples of specific orders, both Democratic and Republican lawmakers have questioned the legality of the U.S. military deploying to American cities and blowing up suspected drug boats in the Caribbean.
“Know that we have your back, because now, more than ever, the American people need you,” the lawmakers said.
President Donald Trump responded by writing on Truth Social, “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!” He also reposted a supporter who wrote, “HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD !!”
Hegseth has been exploring ways to punish Kelly, including administratively reducing his rank from captain to commander, according to CNN.
The senator, who was elected in 2020 and whose wife, former Rep. Gabby Giffords, survived an attempted assassination in 2011, has dismissed the court-martial threat as “almost comical,” and called it a “ridiculous” way for Hegseth to appease the president.
“He’s going to prosecute me under the Uniform Code of Military Justice for… reciting the Uniform Code of Military Justice,” he told late-night host Jimmy Kimmel on Tuesday. “You can’t make this s–t up.”
The video also features former intelligence officers Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin and New Hampshire Rep. Maggie Goodlander; Pennsylvania Reps. Chris Deluzio, who served in the U.S. Navy, and Chrissy Houlahan, who was with the Air Force; and former paratrooper and Army Ranger Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado.
The post Pentagon Pete May Have Accidentally Kneecapped His Own Revenge Plot appeared first on The Daily Beast.
