Pete Hegseth Is a Walking Dead Nominee

S usie Wiles, who co-chaired Donald Trump’s campaign and is now his incoming chief of staff, helped pilot her boss through an electoral effort that, by Trump standards, was a model of discipline and control. But she made one mistake once the election was over. She took a few days off. Within that week, Trump — urged in her absence by such “kitchen cabinet” advisers as his son Donald Jr., Tucker Carlson, and radio talk show host Dan Bongino (though Bongino denies any role in their selection) — had chosen Matt Gaetz as his nominee for attorney general and Fox News host Pete Hegseth as his nominee for secretary of defense.

The ticking time bomb that was Gaetz quickly blew up under scrutiny and after he had tried to avoid the release of a devastating House Ethics Committee report by trying to leave Congress for the safety of the Justice Department. But Hegseth has held on, and — aided by a thuggish group of online MAGA satellite players who threaten anyone who raises objections to his nomination — his team has proclaimed that he has the votes to win Senate approval after his confirmation hearing concludes this week.

Talk about bravado. People who insist that Trump will stick with Hegseth through thick and thin ignore how quickly he dropped the Gaetz hot potato and the history of Rear Admiral Ronny Jackson (Trump’s nominee to head the veterans department (VA) in 2018). Jackson had a very strong tie to Trump — he was Trump’s personal physician in the White House — but he nonetheless had to withdraw from consideration after allegations surfaced that he had created a toxic work environment and maintained poor prescription records.

Hegseth lobbied very hard to head the VA when the job became available in 2018. But the group of seasoned advisers, including Vice President Mike Pence, who met at the time to screen potential candidates, agreed even then that Hegseth’s baggage, personal behavior, and lack of management experience precluded his nomination. In the days immediately after the November 2024 election, however, these advisers were not the people hanging around the lobby of Mar-a-Lago dispensing opinions.

An issue that arose during the consideration of Hegseth to head the VA in 2018 was the possibility that he could be vulnerable to blackmail. Ever since President Dwight Eisenhower signed Executive Order 10450 (which was, ironically, strengthened by President Bill Clinton in 1997), anyone who shows “vulnerability to exploitation and coercion” is barred from sensitive national security positions. Hegseth is a walking demonstration of why that prohibition exists. He was asked by Megyn Kelly why he gave a woman who was accusing him of sexual assault a payout and then insisted that she sign a nondisclosure agreement (an agreement he later concealed from the Trump transition team). Hegseth responded:

I paid her because I had to — or at least I thought I did at the time. I had a great job at Fox and a wonderful marriage. . . . It is not what I should have done, but I did it to protect that. I did it to protect my wife, I did it to protect my family, and I did it to protect my job. It was a negotiation purely to try to prevent that.

Greg Kelly, a Newsmax host and former active-duty jet pilot in the Marine Corps, wrote this weekend in Newsweek:

This is the essence of blackmail: coercion through exploitation. . . . Hegseth’s admission aligns directly with these disqualifiers. He has already demonstrated a willingness to pay off his accuser, allegedly to protect his personal and professional life. As Secretary of Defense, his responsibilities would be infinitely more critical, and his adversaries exponentially more dangerous.

If Hegseth capitulated to blackmail once, what assurance do we have that he wouldn’t do so again, this time with grave consequences for national security?

All of this makes clear that the debate over Hegseth’s suitability to lead the Pentagon has been delayed but not concluded. GOP senators on the Armed Services Committee have seemed subdued regarding his nomination, in part because of fear that MAGA forces will promote a primary challenge against anyone who questions Trump’s pick. Chairman Roger Wicker (R., Miss.) has declined to denounce political threats against his committee members, making even senators who are not on the committee leery of commenting.

Then there is Hegseth’s FBI background check. Armed Services Committee sources told NBC News that its delivery, only late last Friday, represented an “unprecedented” delay in the context of confirmation hearings for a major department. Chairman Wicker and Senator Jack Reed (D., R.I.), the committee’s ranking member, are the only senators who have read the report. But several senators from both parties are demanding to see it. Senator Tommy Tuberville, an Alabama Republican and staunch Trump ally, has insisted to reporters, “I’m going to see it.”

According to one senator, Wicker didn’t poll his fellow Republicans on the committee until last Thursday. He found that support for Hegseth falls short, for now, of a committee majority. If his nomination goes to the Senate floor, where there are only 53 Republicans, Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine are likely to vote no. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, liberated from his duties as GOP Senate leader, is also a likely no. Moreover, GOP Senators Joni Ernst of Iowa, Thom Tillis of North Carolina, and John Curtis of Utah (who just replaced his good friend Mitt Romney in the Senate) are said to be irritated by ad buys in their states from MAGA groups that demand that they vote to confirm Hegseth.

Hegseth has met with many senators — almost all Republicans — to answer their questions. The results have been uneven. Some are enthusiastic about his iconoclastic personality and opposition to a “woke” military. But others say that when he is pressed on specifics about his proposed Pentagon reforms, he retreats to platitudes and generalities. He has also been vague in detailing his management skills — perhaps in part because his biggest leadership role so far has been at the veterans group Vets for Freedom, which he left in 2009 after it ran out of money and an audit found irregularities.

All of this controversy has only emboldened Senate Democrats to hunt for Hegseth’s scalp during his confirmation hearing on Tuesday.

Axios reports that “Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is privately pressing his senators to create fireworks when they question President-elect Trump’s nominees.” Schumer, in an effort to seize the narrative from a GOP intent on passing expansive bills on taxes, border security, and regulation, told his fellow Democrats: “Republicans spent four years attacking the Democratic brand and we need to use the hearings to begin returning the favor.”

Some of Hegseth’s MAGA allies claim that even if some GOP senators refuse to vote to confirm him, they can pick up a rogue Democrat such as Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania. That’s a pipe dream. Which sane Democratic senator would vote for Hegseth knowing that doing so would stir up a primary challenge from progressives and risk his taking the blame if something were to go terribly wrong with Hegseth at the Pentagon?

Hegseth looks hale and hearty going into his confirmation hearing. In reality, he could succumb at any moment to a worsening case of political walking pneumonia.