A Trump loyalist wrote an article in Politico blaming Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for chaos and dysfunction at the Defense Department.
Before he was confirmed by the Senate, critics warned that the FOX News host had minimal administrative experience and was completely unqualified to lead one of the nation’s largest bureaucracies. He had run two small veterans’ groups into the ground and was fired from both.
In addition, the media reported that Hegseth conducted yet another Signal chat about bombing targets that included unauthorized people, including his wife, his brother, his personal lawyer, and a dozen other friends.
In the following article, John Pullyer predicts that Trump will replace Hegseth swiftly.
John Ullyot is former chief Pentagon spokesman and led communications at the National Security Council and the Department of Veterans Affairs in President Donald Trump’s first term. He resigned from the Pentagon last week. He was a senior communications adviser on Trump’s 2016 campaign.
It’s been a month of total chaos at the Pentagon. From leaks of sensitive operational plans to mass firings, the dysfunction is now a major distraction for the president — who deserves better from his senior leadership.President Donald Trump has a strong record of holding his top officials to account. Given that, it’s hard to see Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth remaining in his role for much longer.
The latest flashpoint is a near collapse inside the Pentagon’s top ranks. On Friday, Hegseth fired three of his most loyal senior staffers — senior adviser Dan Caldwell, deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick and Colin Carroll, chief of staff to the deputy secretary of Defense. In the aftermath, Defense Department officials working for Hegseth tried to smear the aides anonymously to reporters, claiming they were fired for leaking sensitive information as part of an investigation ordered earlier this month.
Yet none of this is true. While the department said that it would conduct polygraph tests as part of the probe, not one of the three has been given a lie detector test. In fact, at least one of them has told former colleagues that investigators advised him he was about to be cleared officially of any wrongdoing. Unfortunately, Hegseth’s team has developed a habit of spreading flat-out, easily debunked falsehoods anonymously about their colleagues on their way out the door.
On Friday, POLITICO reported that Hegseth’s chief of staff, Joe Kasper, was leaving his role. Kasper had requested the investigation into the Pentagon leaks, which reportedly included military operational plans for the Panama Canal and a pause in the collection of intelligence for Ukraine.
Hegseth is now presiding over a strange and baffling purge that will leave him without his two closest advisers of over a decade — Caldwell and Selnick — and without chiefs of staff for him and his deputy. More firings may be coming, according to rumors in the building.
In short, the building is in disarray under Hegseth’s leadership.