Pete Hegseth knows that he is fighting for his job, and the momentum to impeach him is growing. Somebody has to take the fall in the Republican Party for losing the midterm election, and Trump firing his chief of staff wasn’t enough.
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The effort to impeach Hegseth predates the midterm election. Massie explained the urgency to impeach and get Hegseth out as Secretary of Defense at a Monday press conference, saying the Defense Secretary is carrying out illegal actions that are killing people.
At his own Tuesday morning press conference, Hegseth filled the air with more empty faux testosterone bluster, but what he didn’t have was a solid legal basis for violating the War Powers Act, and also for targeting civilians in the Caribbean and Iran.
Hegseth did this at multiple points in his remarks to hide behind the troops.
The Secretary of Defense falsely claimed that his impeachment was an impeachment of the troops and that the articles of impeachment accused the troops of war crimes.
Rep. Massie said that he intentionally did not accuse Hegseth of war crimes, but that he wants to have a serious discussion about the Executive Branch ignoring the Constitution and ignoring congressional authority on war.
Hegseth spent much of the press conference praising Trump loudly, but then slipped in the defense that he was ordered to carry out these acts by the president.
