When Republican presidents take a beating in the midterms, Cabinet changes can come the next day.
In 2006, as Americans tired of President George W. Bush and a miscalculated war, Democrats swept control of Congress. The morning after the election, Bush forced out Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld: “The timing is right for new leadership at the Pentagon,” Bush said, adding, “Iraq is not working well enough, fast enough.” Twelve years later, Democrats flipped the U.S. House on the night of President Donald Trump’s first midterm. By morning, he forced Attorney General Jeff Sessions to resign for being insufficiently loyal, later saying the appointment was his “greatest mistake.”
This year, signs point to another potential blue wave, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth seems the prime candidate for a pink slip. At the Pentagon, senior military and civilian officials have resigned or retired rather than continue working for him. On Capitol Hill, lawmakers from both parties have introduced impeachment resolutions this year, and Democrats have promised a flood of public hearings and investigations should they retake the House. A recent Economist-YouGov poll found a majority of registered voters — and nearly one-quarter of Trump voters — support impeaching him.
When the midterm dust settles, Hegseth’s low approval ratings, drumbeat of negative press and status as a bipartisan liability could give the White House reason to cut its losses. But while letting Hegseth go may rid Trump of a political headache, it would not erase the consequences of the defense secretary’s tenure that will outlast him: the mismanagement of the Iran war, the politicization of the military, the culture war inside the Pentagon and the purge of senior leaders. For Trump, changing defense secretaries could be a useful political reset ahead of his lame-duck years. For the military, though, the morning after would be the first day on a long road to normalcy — or confirmation of new norms in an institution with a long memory.
Midterm elections are often treated as a referendum on the incumbent president, so changes to the Cabinet aren’t unusual. Such moves are usually undertaken to shift blame or accountability, signal a course correction or reassert executive authority. But Trump’s turnover of Cabinet officials occurs faster and more often than any president in a century. His rationale for doing so has rarely been consistent — sometimes it’s a matter of loyalty, sometimes personal conduct or poor performance, and sometimes because the official had become an unwelcome distraction. These firings further insulate Trump from congressional oversight. And they help clear his immediate political problem while the departments that the ousted officials leave behind are forced to endure the fallout.
Whenever Hegseth leaves the Pentagon, the military will have to address three institutional crises of his making. Rectifying wartime missteps and restoring readiness are the most immediate one. Military leaders have warned that prolonged war with Iran, depleted weapons stockpiles, and a lack of focus on innovation and transformation have created a “window of vulnerability,” placing other security priorities at risk. Fixing these issues will require strategic reassessments of the military’s global posture and force structure — and lots of funding for a Pentagon running low on cash.
The second is the urgent need to rebalance civil-military relations. Hegseth has overseen an era in which meritocracy at the highest levels of leadership has been supplanted by favoritism and ideological loyalty. Senior officers lament the sidelining of military lawyers and inspectors general who ensure orders and operations are lawful. And while civilian control of the military is a bedrock constitutional principle, Hegseth’s micromanagement of promotions and grooming standards, restrictions on press access and lack of transparency have contributed to the public’s faltering confidence in the military.
The third crisis relates to the management of the talent gaps created by the forced leadership exodus. Senior officials and experts note the loss of expertise, institutional knowledge and years of investment that come with each dismissal. Those human capital deficits cannot be closed by simply giving the job to someone else.
Though Hegseth seems to remain in Trump’s good graces, one needn’t look far for a model of how the defense secretary could be let go: see former Homeland Security secretary Kristi L. Noem. Her uncritical loyalty and telegenic appearance fit Trump’s preference for high-profile appointments. But bad press over deportation operations, killings of American citizens by immigration agents, mismanagement of money and personnel, and poor performance in congressional hearings proved too much to ignore. Her ouster was dressed up as a promotion to special envoy. The White House might similarly provide Hegseth with a soft landing. In both instances, Trump could admit no policy missteps, implicitly pin the blame on the outgoing secretary and gift his soldier a somewhat face-saving exit.
Making a bold Cabinet move following the midterms would offer Trump some relief from a self-inflicted headache and make it someone else’s job to clean up the mess. But while he can move on by the afternoon, the morning after in the Pentagon will last a generation.
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