Trump Gives Astonishing Update On Pete Hegseth After Tragedy
A letter endorsing Pete Hegseth, former Fox News anchor and Army veteran, as President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for defense secretary has garnered the support of numerous retired military leaders.
Following weeks of intense media scrutiny, much of it based on anonymous sources, over 120 retired generals and admirals have come forward to offer their “strong support” for Hegseth.
In their letter, they stated, “He understands combat from the grassroots level and will bring that much-needed perspective with him as the next SECDEF.”
The flag officers further emphasized, “He has studied and experienced the disastrous effects Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) has on our military, and he is committed to expunging it from our armed forces. His focus is solely on warfighting readiness so that our military is prepared to fulfill its mission—to fight and win our nation’s wars.”
The retired leaders highlighted Hegseth’s clear dedication to the military, with his service in Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrating that he is the “warrior” the country needs to lead the armed forces.
They also noted that Trump chose Hegseth from a pool of capable and skilled candidates, deeming him the most qualified to lead the Pentagon and implement necessary reforms.
“President Trump has the right and responsibility to select key people who are capable of fulfilling his promises to the American people. Prominent in that mandate was making our military strong and lethal, to include removing what is called ‘wokeness’ in the form of (DEI) from our armed forces,” the retired officers explained.
Over the past week and a half, more Republican senators have expressed confidence in Hegseth’s ability to lead the Department of Defense following their meetings with the 44-year-old nominee. Trump, addressing reporters on Monday, discussed Hegseth’s confirmation process and noted significant progress.
“He’s going to be great,” Trump said. “Look, he went to Princeton. He went to Harvard. He was a great student there. But he really was, from the first day I met him, all he wanted to talk about was military. He’s just a military guy. I think it’s a natural.”
While the America First agenda has shaped Trump’s election mandate, a prominent Republican critic of the president-elect appears poised to oppose significant elements of the incoming administration’s foreign policy approach.
In an essay published in Foreign Affairs on Monday, Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) criticized Trump’s foreign policy direction and urged him to abandon America First’s “flirtation with isolation and decline.”
McConnell also advocated for positions Trump explicitly opposed during the campaign, including increasing military support for Ukraine, pursuing free trade agreements, strengthening NATO collaboration, and expanding foreign aid.
“The [Trump] administration will face calls from within the Republican Party to give up on American primacy,” McConnell wrote in Foreign Affairs. “It must reject them. To pretend that the United States can focus on just one threat at a time, that its credibility is divisible, or that it can afford to shrug off faraway chaos as irrelevant is to ignore its global interests and its adversaries’ global designs. America will not be made great again by those who simply want to manage its decline.”