Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth defended the Iran war and his job performance while lavishing praise on President Donald Trump in a lengthy video Thursday, as critics continued to petition for his removal after Republicans’ trouncing in the midterm elections.
Hegseth’s defiant stand was recorded outside the Pentagon and posted to social media as part of a coordinated messaging campaign, one that appears aimed at aggrandizing his record and shoring up support for the embattled Pentagon chief.
The video was released days after the GOP lost control of Congress — a repudiation from voters that Trump and Vice President JD Vance have tied directly to the war — and as Hegseth’s team faces pushback from lawmakers about the Defense Department’s $1.5 trillion budget request. Trump has signaled that he intends to stick with Hegseth, though he is said to be searching for someone he can blame for the party’s disastrous showing on Election Day.
“When we say that Iran will not have a nuclear weapon, we actually mean it,” Hegseth said in the nearly six-minute video. “And we will do the hard work to ensure it under the leadership of President Trump.”
Hegseth said he believes the conflict is a “courageous and historic effort.” He added that “regardless how people feel about the war,” the U.S. military needs funding approved from Congress in coming weeks to “meet the moment” and keep the United States ahead of its adversaries.
The official White House account on X, along with a cadre of political appointees on Hegseth’s team at the Pentagon, launched a messaging campaign in tandem with the secretary’s video. Their social media posts all contained the same message: “Stand. Fight. Defend the Republic.”
Trump also reiterated his support for Hegseth while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday afternoon, saying Hegseth has done “a fantastic job.” The president cited a reduction in the number of generals during Hegseth’s tenure, adding that “many of those people were woke, and I don’t like a woke general.”
Trump again downplayed the Iran war, claiming that the U.S. controls the Strait of Hormuz despite regular attacks on ships there.
The attempts to burnish Hegseth’s image post-election came as an impeachment effort against Hegseth looms in the House. Led by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky), the vote could occur as soon as next week.
Hegseth’s chief spokesman, Sean Parnell, convened a team “to map the most aggressive defense of Secretary Hegseth and the President’s agenda ever assembled,” said Joel Valdez, a Pentagon spokesman, in a statement. “Offensive maneuvers,” he wrote, are still to come in a next phase of the plan.
“The full scope of that strategy is not being disclosed,” Valdez wrote. “What we’ve learned from this President is never back down and fight, fight, fight!”
At the same time, Democrats have vowed to pursue investigations targeting the defense secretary when they take power in January. Party leaders have said they intend to scrutinize the Iran war, which began more than eight months ago without the consent of Congress, along with Hegseth’s approval of military strikes on alleged drug traffickers, his firing of numerous military leaders and the dismantling of diversity initiatives across the department.
The Trump administration launched the Iran war in February in concert with Israel, initially predicting it would take just a few weeks to topple the regime in Tehran. Iran responded by closing the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway vital to the oil trade, which caused gasoline prices to soar globally and made affordability a central issue for American voters.
The conflict remains unresolved.
Earlier Thursday, Jonathan Karl of ABC News reported that the president, in an interview, said he had received complaints about Hegseth but has “every intention” of retaining him. Trump, Karl reported, also acknowledged that he would have a difficult time getting a replacement defense secretary confirmed once Democrats take power in the Senate.
In his video, Hegseth, dressed in a blue suit and red striped tie, assailed “Democrats and deep-state radicals” who dislike him and said it’s because the Trump administration “tore down their sacred cows” in the Pentagon. He listed a number of his frequent targets, including climate change, diversity, senior military leaders and the news media.
“They attack me — they attack us — because we’re effective,” Hegseth said. “It’s not going to work. We’re not going to back down.”
He reserved some of his strongest criticism for Massie, the anti-war Republican pushing for his removal. Hegseth called Massie, who lost his primary in May as Trump and Hegseth targeted him politically, a “disgruntled, defeated congressman” and denounced what he called his “sham articles of impeachment.”
“You see, their policies don’t work, so their obsession with political theater, disguised as power, drives them to try to destroy their opponent,” Hegseth said.
“It’s all about the politics of personal destruction. It didn’t work against President Trump, and it won’t work with me.”
Hegseth faced renewed criticism following his release of the video.
Rep. Austin Scott (R-Georgia) said the Pentagon budget and the annual defense policy bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act, are “necessary to finish the war that will prevent a nuclear Iran” and that they require bipartisan support.
“The secretary’s job is to build alliances at home and abroad to protect America,” Scott said. “Had he done this, this war would already be over.”
Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colorado) said Hegseth’s video shows that he is “desperate to keep his job” after “failing our servicemembers and starting new forever wars.”
“Tick tock, Mr. Secretary,” Crow wrote.
The comments arrived as another possible avenue for Hegseth appeared to close. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tennessee), who won an election Tuesday to become the next governor of her state, is not considering selecting Hegseth to fill the remainder of her Senate term, a Republican operative said.
The disclosure came after speculation that Hegseth, who owns a home in Tennessee, could receive a soft landing and step down as defense secretary by becoming a senator. Hegseth is not interested in the role, a person familiar with his thinking said.
Noah Robertson contributed to this report.
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