Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth torched Rep. Thomas Massie’s impeachment resolution during his first Pentagon press briefing in six months on Tuesday, calling it sabotage and daring its backers to come after American troops through him. He defended every operation in question, from the Iran war to the narco-terrorist boat strikes. “If they want to come for the warriors, they’re going to have to come through me,” Hegseth said.
The remarks came one day after Massie read his resolution into the record on the House floor, the chamber’s first day back after the midterm elections. The Kentucky Republican’s articles target Hegseth’s handling of the war with Iran along with the military actions in Yemen and Venezuela. Massie said Hegseth “knowingly executed and implemented unlawful orders” and “remains a threat to the Constitution.” A House vote could come by midweek.
Hegseth framed the resolution as the third run at a play the country has watched fail twice. “They impeached President Trump over a perfect phone call. They impeached him again in his final week in office. Both times he came back stronger. Now they’re trying a third time. This time against a member of his cabinet, they will fail again,” he said. “And if standing with President Trump puts me in that company, I’ll take that company every day of the week.”
As the Associated Press reported, Massie lost his May primary to Ed Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL recruited by President Trump. Hegseth then told reporters what the resolution does. “It tells our enemies, Iran, the cartels, every adversary watching, that the United States will actually punish its own warriors and its own civilian leadership for successfully executing lawful military operations,” he said, adding that it “puts a target on the backs of American warriors by signaling that Congress will undermine their missions in real time. This is not patriotism. This is sabotage.”
He ran through the record, starting with the Houthis, who “fired on American ships” until Operation Rough Rider “hit them more than 1000 times” and they “cried uncle.” Operation Midnight Hammer sent “B-2s from the heartland, halfway around the world, straight into Fordo, Natanz, and Esfahan, flawless.” Operation Epic Fury delivered “under 40 days of sustained combat, more than 13,000 targets struck” and left “more than 80 percent of their nuclear industrial base gone.”
The cartel campaign got its own accounting: “More than 70 narco vessels sunk, 218 narco terrorists dead, where they should be,” he said. He saved one of his sharpest lines for Nicolas Maduro. “He was not kidnapped. He was brought to justice by America’s best. Victory in one night, victory in 48 minutes, to be precise. And today he sits in front of an American judge in New York City,” Hegseth said.
“This is not about me,” he said. “Politicians in Washington have accused the sailors and the pilots who struck narco terrorist boats of war crimes for doing their job,” he continued, calling it the next step: “Put the secretary on trial today, and the men and women who carried out those orders tomorrow.” On the eve of Veterans Day, he told the warriors of Epic Fury that their service “was not a crime.” “These are heroes, and no politician in Washington will tell them otherwise while I hold this office,” Hegseth said.
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Watch Hegseth tear into Massie here:
He also pointed at who filed the articles, branding Massie “this defeated politician, defeated ironically by a Navy SEAL, I might add.” The operations on the list, “Iran, the cartels, Maduro, Yemen,” were each “a lawful operation ordered by the commander in chief, then ordered by myself, notified to Congress and executed by American warriors who did their jobs,” he said. “These are not high crimes. This is the job, and it’s the job well done.”
President Trump posted his review minutes after the briefing wrapped, as the Associated Press reported. “Pete Hegseth gets an ‘A’ PLUS, PLUS, PLUS for his defense against a disgruntled, angry, defeated, former Congressman, Thomas Massie, a TOTAL LOSER!” the president wrote. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell added that despite “threats of sham witch hunts from Democrats,” Hegseth is “100% committed to leading the Department until the end of President Trump’s term in office.”
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video.