Summary
Senate Majority Leader John Thune has told Donald Trump that Pete Hegseth likely has enough votes to be confirmed as Defense Secretary, despite controversy over past sexual misconduct allegations, a financial settlement, and concerns about his leadership and alcohol use.
Hegseth’s confirmation hearing is set for Jan. 14, with Senate Republicans aiming to expedite key national security confirmations before Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration.
Other high-profile hearings, including for Marco Rubio (State), Pam Bondi (Attorney General), and Tulsi Gabbard (DNI), are tentatively scheduled for the same week amidst ongoing bipartisan negotiations.
Well, he promised he would stop drinking during work hours, so it’s probably fine.
Such a major indictment of the Republican Senate majority and their complete subservience to the Orange Jesus in installing the least qualified and most unfit person ever to be nominated for the top Pentagon job.
This guy sucks, but IMHO, more energy should be spent on tanking people like Patel and RFK. They’re an even bigger threat to American citizens.
Far-right Christo-Fascist White Supremacist Pete Hegseth vs Brain-Worm Conspiracy Nut RFK?
I think RFK isn’t smart enough to do enough real damage on a global scale. He just has some stupid ideas that will help insurance companies and the medical system make more money when people get sick from preventable diseases. More company profits.
Add Tulsi Gabbard who is either the most clueless useful idiot out there or (more likely) clearly working for Russia.
I think they’re all bad enough to fundamentally and permanently damage democracy in the US, so it’s good not to “prioritize” in this case. Hegseth can enable Trump to use our actual armed forces to enforce whatever whim he has, which is about as scary as you can get. They all need to be prevented from taking their roles.
It’s transparent how “consent” is being manufactured here.
Prime the public early enough, and regardless of the level of outrage the news cycles will die down before confirmation. At that point the people who are outraged will predominantly be resigned, the bar will be lower, and the senators have cover to confirm.
It’s the typical narcissist’s boundary-pushing playbook. And it’s still working fine for Trump going on eight decades.
I wonder how many Democrats will be joining these shit Republicans in putting this completely unqualified and sexual abuser into a leadership position?
