'He's Going to Have to Explain It': Surprise Defense Secretary Pick's History Takes Center Stage

He has repeatedly called to ban women from serving in combat roles in the military.

He advocated extensively to gain pardons for troops accused and convicted of war crimes.

And he was one of a dozen troops turned away from serving on the National Guard mission to defend the Capitol, allegedly over tattoos that are popular with neo-Nazi and far-right groups.

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Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump's surprise pick to be the next defense secretary, has an extensive history of combat in the culture wars that have been brewing over the military for the past decade.

Prior to Trump's announcement Tuesday evening that he was nominating Hegseth, the National Guard veteran was most known as a co-host on the weekend edition of "Fox and Friends," one of Trump's favorite TV shows. But in choosing Hegseth, Trump landed on a defense secretary nominee with a record of public statements that line up with the promises Trump made on the campaign trail to root out alleged "wokeness" within the military.

Senators from both parties tasked with considering his nomination responded Wednesday by saying that they have a lot of questions about Hegseth's history and those past statements, but broadly insisted they were reserving judgment.

"I'm going to have to visit with him about those remarks," Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, the Senate's first female combat veteran who was rumored to be in the running for Trump's defense secretary, told reporters Wednesday when asked about Hegseth's opposition to women in combat.

"Even a staff member of mine, she is an infantry officer. She's back in Iowa now. She is a tumble. So he's going to have to explain it," Ernst added, though she did not answer when Military.com asked whether she would vote against Hegseth over the issue.

And while initial reaction to Hegseth's selection from former officials and some lobbyists outside the Pentagon was blunt and laced with colorful expletives, inside the building, reactions from rank-and-file officials varied between muted or unfazed to simply trying to get on with their daily tasks and tune out the political turmoil outside.

One senior defense official simply said that they were focused on a smooth transition between administrations, but pointedly noted that Trump officials have yet to sign the official legal forms with the General Services Administration that enable the transition process to formally begin.

Hegseth served in the National Guard from 2002 to 2021, rising to the rank of major, with deployments to Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, according to service records released by the Army on Wednesday. His awards include two Bronze Stars, two Army Commendation Medals and the expert infantryman and combat infantryman badges, according to the records.

In recent years, Hegseth has aggressively opposed efforts to make the military more welcoming to women, those from minority groups and LGBTQ+ people -- efforts that Republicans collectively deride as "wokeness."

In his most recent book, "The War on Warriors," released in June, he lamented what he described as a shift away from war fighting to "social justice, transgender [and] woke training." He also attributed many of the Pentagon's perceived struggles to the integration of women into the military, especially in combat roles -- a process still in its early stages.

He reiterated those views in a podcast appearance earlier this month, telling host Shawn Ryan that he was "straight-up saying we should not have women in combat roles."

He also advocated for firing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. C.Q. Brown, who has become a target of far-right Republicans complaining about wokeness.

"First of all, you've got to fire the chairman of the Joint Chiefs," Hegseth said on the podcast. "Any general that was involved, any general, admiral, whatever, that was involved in any of the [diversity, equity and inclusion] woke shit has got to go."

Democrats were not ready Wednesday to oppose Hegseth over those comments.

Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., the current chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee who will be ranking member of the committee next year, said he would have to "look closely" at Hegseth's record, though he said he was "skeptical" because of Hegseth's lack of leadership experience.

Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, an Armed Services Committee member who caucuses with Democrats, similarly suggested he doesn't know enough about Hegseth to make a decision yet.

"I don't know much about him," King said. "I haven't seen a lot that impresses me as qualifications for one of the most complicated and important jobs in the country, if not the world. So I'm going to await, as I always do, the hearings and information."

Even if Democrats oppose Hegseth, he will only need a simple majority to be confirmed, and Republicans will hold 53 seats in the Senate next year.

Republicans similarly were withholding judgment Wednesday.

Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., an Armed Services Committee member, commended Hegseth's military service but acknowledged he lacks leadership experience.

"Now it's a matter of asking him questions, learning more about him and so forth. So I'll go into that with an open mind," Rounds said. "Until I get a chance to actually talk to him, and until I get a chance to actually understand the direction he's going -- does he see the strategic needs that we have to address within the Department of Defense?"

One hurdle to confirmation that other recent defense secretaries have faced appears not to be a factor in Hegseth's case -- a waiver to a law that bars recent service members from being Pentagon chief. While Hegseth left the Guard within the seven-year timeframe of that law, experts who spoke with Military.com said the law only applies to active components of the military, not the Guard.

"This doesn't apply. It's about active duty and the whole reason why we have the requirement is to ensure effective civilian control over the military, so the more distant you are from active, day-to-day service, the stronger the presumed protection is for civilian control," said retired Army Lt. Col. Daniel Maurer, a former judge advocate and current associate professor of law at Ohio Northern University. "If you're a reservist or National Guard ... you are already a civilian, primarily."

Hegseth would also come into the defense secretary job with a record of advocating on behalf of service members accused and convicted of war crimes and amid questions about his stint in the D.C. National Guard.

In 2019, during Trump's first term in office, Hegseth used his platform on Fox News, as well as private phone calls with the president, to convince Trump to exonerate two Army officers accused of murder while serving in Afghanistan and lessen the punishment of Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher. Gallagher was convicted of posing for a photograph with the corpse of an ISIS prisoner, though he was acquitted of fatally stabbing the wounded detainee.

One of the soldiers, 1st Lt. Clint Lorance, was found guilty in a 2013 court-martial of second-degree murder, making false statements and other charges after he ordered his platoon to fire on three Afghan men on a motorcycle. He was later pardoned by Trump. The other soldier, Maj. Mathew Golsteyn, was charged with murder after killing a suspected, unarmed Taliban bombmaker, later burning his body. Golsteyn also received a Trump presidential pardon.

Meanwhile, while serving in the D.C. National Guard, Hegseth was among at least a dozen guardsmen pulled from the mission to secure the Capitol in the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.

In his book, he claims he was removed for having a Jerusalem Cross cross tattoo. But he also has a Deus vult cross tattoo – a symbol rooted in the First Crusade, where it served as a rallying cry in Christian battles against Muslims and Jews. Hegseth also has the words "Deus Vult" -- the phrase is Latin for "God wills it" -- inked on his biceps near the cross.

Today, the words and symbol, especially taken together, have largely been co-opted by neo-Nazi and far-right groups, frequently surfacing in extremist protests, including the violent 2017 rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

During the first Trump transition, Hegseth was among the names floated to head the Department of Veterans Affairs, a position where he would have built upon his work as president and CEO of Concerned Veterans for America, a conservative group that does not disclose its membership or financial backing but was established with funds from libertarian billionaires David and Charles Koch.

Hegseth led CVA from 2012 to 2016, a timeframe that coincided with a tumultuous period at the VA, rocked by a scandal over appointment delays, cancellations and secret scheduling calendars that was linked to the deaths of more than 40 veterans.

As the Pentagon prepares for Hegseth and the incoming Trump administration, the senior defense official who spoke to Military.com said that the department wasn't taking any major steps to safeguard policies currently in place or rolled out by the Biden administration, because a future secretary of defense would have the power to override any policy they see fit.

"There's not much to safeguard," they said.

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