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| 2017 dinner image from The Wrap |
The news is widespread, linking here initially only to AJ, (which has links on other nominations made by Trump). Hegseth has a Wikipedia page.
A bit of editorializing: The sidebar has a Bernie image saying we need politicians "who stand up to billionaires and corporations." Hegseth has ties to Rupert Murdoch via FOX, and to the Koch disinformation network. Both have paid him money for services. He is from Minnesota, and has a Princeton degree. He served at Guantanamo doing internment duty, or that is my understanding. He, like Trump, is on his third wife.
UPDATE: Yahoo News reports:
Just last week, Hegseth said, “I’m straight up just saying, we should not have women in combat roles.
“It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated,” he explained. “Our institutions don’t have to incentivize that in places where traditionally—not traditionally, over history—men in those positions are more capable.”
Hegseth doesn’t seem to want anyone but white men to be in the military. In his 2024 book The War on Warriors, Hegseth painted the military as anti-white and suffering from a “long-term infection of radical left wing social justice policies.”
He wrote that “affirmative action posts have skyrocketed, with ‘firsts’ being the most important factor in filling new commanders. We will not stop until trans-lesbian Black females run everything!”
Trump seemed to echo many of Hegseth’s complaints on the campaign trail, with his own ramblings about “woke” military leadership.
Hegseth has repeatedly fearmongered about the spread of Islam in the United States, both as a contributor to Fox News and in his 2020 book, American Crusade.
“Just like the Christian crusaders who pushed back the Muslim hordes in the twelfth century, American Crusaders will need to muster the same courage against Islamists today,” Hegseth wrote in his book.
“Islamists—and even mainstream Muslims—use aggressive tactics to exploit American ‘tolerance’ as utter weakness in order to achieve accommodations that would never otherwise be tolerated,” he wrote. “I’m not talking about on the battlefield, I’m talking about in our classrooms, city councils, and social media.”
Taking on Islamists is a step away from taking on billionaires and corporations. Islamists are not featured heavily in Defense appropriations. SpaceX is.
He is reported to be an evangelical Christian.
FURTHER: Nepotism -
Hegseth engaged in two extramarital affairs with co-workers during two marriages and paid his brother — who had no professional experience — $108,000 to work for him while chief executive of a non-profit. And while running a political action committee in his native Minnesota, Hegseth spent a third of the PAC's money on Christmas parties for families and friends.
Wikipedia fleshes out, his brother had recently graduated, and Pete put him into a position with the Koch brothers funded operation - a nominal nonprofit, doing Koch political things.
Personally, I believe the man's sex life is his own business but does relate to character in terms of a security clearance. My worry, he will not trim the budget but will purge good officers if allowed to. If he trims fat, streamlines and imposes fiscal constraints and bookeeping norms, bless him, but he has to pass the appointment process - Senate approval. The nepotism background and his PAC management history suggest he'd be the opposite of a waste elimination hawk. On that basis, the Crabgrass hope is he is denied Senate approval.
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Will Trump reappoint voucher advocate Betsy DeVos as Education Secretary, to shut down the Cabinet office, or will it be another crony? That is a whole new topic but Crabgrass is unaware if Trump has nominated in that direction.
Project 2025 highlighted total elimination of Dept of Education as a key aim. Trump might appoint nobody, and simply refuse to fund the bureau, even if Congress appropriates. No paycheck, people would be forced to leave.
He is on his version of being on a roll.
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FURTHER: It is reported online, "From 2007 to 2010, he [Hegseth] served as the executive director of Vets for Freedom, a nonprofit organization aimed at educating Americans on the importance of achieving success in Iraq and Afghanistan based on direct knowledge of military strategy and tactics in these regions."
Wikipedia characterizes Vets for Freedom as a political hack operation which touted Joe Lieberman as Presidential, and opposed Barack Obama (i.e., ass-backwards).
The question begs consideration, should the Senate tie up the nomination, who is the next in waiting? The real nominee, after Hegseth "walks point" and gets denied.
A number of Republicans on Capitol Hill were surprised by the announcement following a slate of fairly well-known and well-supported candidates for other national security positions. One House Republican Committee chair expressed shock at learning that Hegseth was chosen, saying he was not on the known list of names under consideration.
Indiana Sen. Todd Young was also unaware of Hegseth, saying "I don't have a sense of his background or his vision for the department." But he said he wanted to give all of Trump's nominees a fair opportunity to be heard.
That said, Trump has focused his attention on appointing loyal allies to positions of power within his incoming administration. In a statement, he praised Hegseth's career, including his work on Fox, saying he used his "platform to fight for our Military and Veterans."
Hegseth has also written several books focused on conservative causes, most recently "The War on Warriors," which, in a blurb on his website, states, "We have only one Pentagon. Either we take it back or surrender it altogether."
Crabgrass guesses, it is a trial balloon with a real nominee to be next offered unless Hegseth suprisingly gets consent of Senate. I.e., this is a "Bork" and will be dead on arrival while paving the way for the real guy/gal. Who might be worse.