President Trump on Thursday doubled down on his backing for War Secretary Pete Hegseth amid rumors he’s considering a replacement before the next Congress is seated, and as Hegseth faces an impeachment effort as soon as next week.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) has said that he will introduce articles of impeachment against Hegseth next week when Congress returns from recess.
Hegseth responded to the looming impeachment attempt in a defiant video message on Thursday, touting his reform at the Pentagon and calling on Congress to pass an additional $350 billion in defense funding.
He called Massie a “disgruntled, defeated congressman,” and likened his “sham” impeachment attempt to past impeachments of President Trump during his first term. “It’s all about the politics of personal destruction,” he said. “Didn’t work against President Trump, and it won’t work with me. You can rest assured of that.”
Trump dismissed reporters asking if he plans to fire Hegseth on Wednesday, saying, “No, I think he’s doing a very good job.”
Asked if Hegseth should replace Marsha Blackburn in the Senate after her successful run for Governor in Tennessee, Trump said again, “I think he’s doing a very good job.”
Still, Trump said, “I actually think he’d be very popular if he did that, but I haven’t heard that at all.”
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On Thursday, Trump was asked about potential staffing changes and reports that he’s considering firing the War Secretary, and he doubled down, saying Hegseth “has done a fantastic job.”
“We had a war with Venezuela; it was over in 48 minutes, we had total success, no deaths. We have, I guess— you have, I don’t know if it’s a war because there hasn’t been anybody killed in many months, but we have a war with a place called the Islamic Republic of Iran, lovely place, and we control the straits. We’re doing more oil right now going through the straits than we did before the war started, and nobody’s been killed in about seven months, six months,” Trump said, defending his handling of the Iran war. “And you know if you look at Russia-Ukraine, see that’s a war. That’s a war. 25,000 people being killed a month.”
“It is virtually an occupation, and we’re not looking to be wise guys, but it is an occupation. And remember this: so we’ve lost 18 lives, and 18 is far too many. But in Vietnam, we lost thousands and thousands of lives over a 21-year period. In Afghanistan, we lost tremendous numbers of lives. 18 is too many, one is too many, but we lost 18 lives, and we’ve been there for seven months. And we have full control of that place,” he continued.
“Pete’s in charge of war, right? Department of War, we made that change. Venezuela has been unbelievable, considered one of the greatest attacks anybody’s ever seen. He was in charge of that, along with me and others. But Venezuela, we’ve taken out billions and billions of dollars worth of oil. I saw this lightweight congressman the other day criticizing me on Iran for spending 25 billion dollars. I said, “Well, we’ve taken much more money out of Venezuela than that.”
Trump went on to suggest that more attacks on Iran are still incoming to “certify” the end of the war.
“Now we’ll make a decision: Do we want to go further and just certify it? By certifying it, meaning where it’ll never happen again. I think it’ll take them 25 years to rebuild the country. I would rather not destroy the rest of the country if possible, but maybe I’ll have to. You’ll know soon enough,” he said.
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