Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth blamed Democrats for “mischaracterizing” the firing spree carried out by President Donald Trump at the Pentagon and said on Sunday that the military’s top brass was not at risk of political reprisals.
The president moved on Friday evening to fire C.Q. Brown, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as well as the chief of the Navy and vice chief of the Air Force. Brown, in a somewhat unprecedented development, is set to be replaced by a retired lieutenant general.
Hegseth joined Fox News Sunday where host Shannon Bream asked him about a statement from Senator Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee. Reed accused the administration of “firing uniformed leaders as a type of political loyalty test” in a statement posted to his Twitter account on Friday.
“That’s a total mischaracterization from Senator Reed, as has been most of the hyperbole in the press around this. There is civilian control of the military. Nothing about this is unprecedented,” said the Defense chief on Sunday.
“The president deserves to pick his key national security and military advisory team,” he added.
Attempting to tie back the president’s actions to those of his predecessors, the secretary stumbled over his words and claimed that Barack Obama had fired “hundreds of militaries during his term.”
His remark was inaccurate; throughout Obama’s two terms in office, the former president dismissed dozens of officers for a wide range of reasons, some being nonpolitical in nature. Others, such as the firing of Stanley McChrystal, resulted from the former president’s desire to change strategy in Afghanistan.
But Obama also sacked Mike Flynn, now a retired lieutenant general, after Flynn gave an interview claiming that he felt like the broader Obama administration did not take the threat of Islamic extremism seriously.
The firings on Friday, however, appear to be in line with an effort to reorganize top military brass to remove anyone accused of being a “DEI hire” by the right. Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the fired Navy chief, had been directly labeled a “DEI hire” by Hegseth himself in a book published just last year.
Brown is only the second Black general to serve as chairman of the Joint Chiefs. In the same book, Hegseth accused Brown of making “the race card one of his biggest calling cards” and claimed that he was pursuing a left-wing agenda.
Caine, who has never served in any of the roles stipulated by the US Code as the bench for promotion to chairman of the Joint Chiefs, will require a special waiver by the president to take on the position. He’ll need Senate confirmation for the job.
Hegseth previously publicly called for the firing of Brown and numerous other members of the top brass. His only requirement for firing seemed to be an acceptance of efforts to diversify the military and make it a more accepting place for women and other Americans.
“Any general that was involved—general, admiral, whatever—that was involved in any of the DEI woke s— has got to go,” Hegseth said last year on a podcast. “Either you’re in for warfighting, and that’s it. That’s the only litmus test we care about.”
