Pete Hegseth, the former Fox News host and nominee for secretary of defense, likely has a clear path to Senate confirmation after Republican senators indicated they would support him, despite new details coming out about the 2017 sexual assault claim against him.
Hegseth, 44, who met with GOP senators on Capitol Hill on Thursday, was accused of sexually assaulting a woman during a conference in 2017, which resulted in a payment made to the woman as part of a confidential settlement. The claim, which was revealed in a 22-page police report, came out Wednesday night. However, the Army National Guard veteran has denied any wrongdoing.
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“As far as the media is concerned, it’s very simple. The matter was fully investigated, and I was completely cleared, and that’s where I’m gonna leave it,” Hegseth said, speaking to reporters after meeting with Republican senators.
Hegseth, who was accompanied by Vice President-elect J.D. Vance, met with Sens. Roger Wicker (R-MS), Marsh Blackburn (R-TN), Bill Haggerty (R-TN), John Barrasso (R-WY) and Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK). All five Senators came out of the meetings with positive reviews, playing down the allegations.
Wicker, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he believes Hegseth’s nomination is “going to be in pretty good shape,” and said they did not discuss the sexual assault allegation in their meeting.
“We weren’t specific, but you know since no charges were brought by authorities, we only have the press reports,” Wicker said, as he got into an elevator following his meeting.
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.@SenatorWicker after his meeting with Pete Hegseth: “I think he’s going to be in pretty good shape.” Wicker says they did not discuss the sexual assault allegation: “We weren’t specific, but you know since no charges were brought by authorities, we only have the press reports.” pic.twitter.com/ztosSppWBG
— Samantha-Jo Roth (@SamanthaJoRoth) November 21, 2024
Barrasso, the incoming No. 2 ranking Republican in the next Congress, called Hegseth a “strong nominee” to lead the Defense Department.
“Pete pledged that the Pentagon will focus on strength and hard power — not the current administration’s woke political agenda,” Barrasso said in a statement Thursday. “National security nominations have a history of quick confirmations in the Senate. I look forward to Pete’s hearing and a vote on the floor in January.”
Blackburn said she would support his nomination and offered no other comments, while Hagerty called the allegations “a he-said, she-said thing” and called it a “shame” that they were being raised in the first place.
Mullin emerged from his meeting with a full-throated defense of Hegseth, claiming “there is no way in the world this was a sexual assault,” after reading the police report.
“I read the report, it’s pretty clear what took place, she definitely wasn’t drugged and I don’t want to get into the entire situation because you can read the report yourself,” he said. “If you read it, you can see it was two people flirting with each other.”
The allegations of sexual misconduct do not appear to be dissuading Republican senators from supporting President-elect Donald Trump’s pick, especially after Trump won the election despite being found liable for sexual abuse last year.
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“I assume that there’s two sides to every story. So, we’re going to treat these folks fairly and hopefully get the president his team,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX). “But, we’re not going to decide based on pieces of the story. We want the whole story”
As the Hegseth nomination proceeds, another controversial nominee, former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), withdrew his nomination for consideration as attorney general on Thursday afternoon. Mullin acknowledged without “Matt’s distraction” there inevitably will be even more scrutiny on Hegseth’s nomination.
“Matt’s distraction is gone now and so you guys are going to be focusing more and more on Pete, which I don’t think is a bad deal and you’ll look more and more at what happened and it’s all been taken completely out of context,” Mullin said to reporters later in the afternoon ahead of a Senate vote. “I think Pete will get confirmed at the end of the day.”
Trump can only afford three defections within the Senate Republican conference to get his picks confirmed with the GOP’s 53-seat majority in the 119th Congress.
Notably, Hegseth did not meet with Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), a combat veteran, who has been an outspoken advocate of preventing military sexual assault and has sponsored bipartisan legislation to hold perpetrators accountable.
In 2019, Ernst was the lone Republican who opposed Air Force Gen. John Hyten who was confirmed, despite sexual assault allegations against him.
Ernst said she was looking forward to meeting with him face-to-face.
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“There’s a lot floating around out there, we need to actually be able to visit with him face to face, and I know the committee will do a thorough vetting,” she said, speaking with reporters on Thursday.
Some GOP senators responded to Hegseth’s nomination with surprise due to his lack of experience in the federal government, but reserved their opinions until after the public nomination hearing process.
The former Fox News host will also need to earn the votes of Republican Senators he’s criticized in the past. He’s previously slammed outgoing GOP Senate Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Susan Collins (R-ME) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK). He was frustrated by the entire conference when they failed to repeal Obamacare during Trump’s first term.
“Clearly we’re going to have to have a full background check and Senate committee investigation and public hearings, which is standard,” Collins said to reporters on Wednesday.
Hegseth will likely have other questions to answer. He said as recently as Nov. 7, that women shouldn’t be allowed in combat. He has also advocated for firing “woke” generals and eliminating the Pentagon’s diversity programs, advocating a “frontal assault” on the Defense Department.
“We need to work this through, we are going to give the president the benefit of the doubt, but we’re going to do our due diligence, which means we will look at all the information and then we will make up our minds based on the information that’s presented,” said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD), speaking with the Washington Examiner.
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Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK), another member of the Armed Services Committee, seemed enthusiastic about Hegseth’s nomination, calling his nomination coupled with Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) as national security advisor and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) as Secretary of State “strong.”
“I’ve been focused on the policies that I’m quite confident he will focus on and implement, and in a big contrast to the current administration,” Sullivan said.
