There’s no shortage of reasons why the Senate should reject Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Defense Department in his second term, but it’s the allegations the former Fox News host has faced from women that should do the most harm to his prospective nomination.
In 2017, for example, a woman accused Hegseth of sexual assaulting her at a conference. He’s denied the allegations, insisting the sexual encounter was consensual. Hegseth ultimately paid his accuser an undisclosed amount of money in exchange for her staying quiet. (No charges were filed in the case because, according to the district attorney, “No charges were supported by proof beyond a reasonable doubt.”)
A year later, according to a report from The New York Times, Hegseth’s mother sent him an email in which she accused him of routinely mistreating women. (She later disavowed that message and apologized in a subsequent email; neither MSNBC nor NBC News have obtained either message.)
In case this weren’t quite enough, The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer wrote a brutal new report indicating that Hegseth was forced to step down from his role leading a couple of advocacy organizations after he was accused of financial mismanagement, personal misconduct, and — you guessed it — sexual impropriety toward women. (Neither NBC News nor MSNBC has independently confirmed the allegations in Mayer’s report. A lawyer representing Hegseth shared a statement with The New Yorker in which he said a Hegseth “adviser” described the report as “outlandish.” Hegseth’s attorney declined to comment to NBC News, and the Trump transition team didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.)
It was against this backdrop that Hegseth made the rounds on Capitol Hill, meeting with several senators on the Republican Steering Committee, none of whom seemed to care about the allegations.
Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, for example, told NBC News that that she considered the allegations a “side issue” while lauding Hegseth’s ability to lead the Pentagon. She added, “Are soldiers sometimes wild childs? Yeah, that can happen.” Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, meanwhile, chided journalists for caring so much about the ugly allegations against a man who might soon lead the world’s largest and strongest military.
But perhaps most striking of all was the reaction from Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama. AL.com reported:
U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., said that rape allegations against President-elect Donald Trump’s defense secretary nominee Pete Hegseth were a thing of the past. … ‘A lot of this stuff was years ago. Now again, you’ve got to be responsible for your actions, but Pete has done everything he possibly can do to get it out there, to talk to people.’
No, really, that’s what he said.
"A lot of this stuff was years ago" — Tommy Tuberville downplays a rape allegation against Pete Hegseth from 2017 pic.twitter.com/h2DlWb6yb0 Right off the bat, describing a sexual assault allegation against a prospective Pentagon nominee as “stuff” seems like a bad idea. What’s more, the “years ago” line made it sound as if the allegations were ancient history and no longer relevant. But that’s insane. By any fair measure, 2017 really wasn’t that long ago. Finally, I was struck by Tuberville’s on-air claim that Hegseth has “done everything he possibly can do” to get the allegation “out there,” which is a curious way of responding to a scandal in which Hegseth paid his accuser to keep quiet. If four of the Senate Republicans’ 53 members balk, Hegseth’s nomination will be defeated. For now, the number of GOP members balking remains at zero.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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