US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth may get the sack soon.
An unnamed official told National Public Radio (NPR) that the White House has begun a process to look for Hegseth’s replacement following reports that he had leaked operational details of Washington’s planned strikes against the Houthis in private chats on the Signal app that could put US military personnel in harm’s way.
The accusation followed another similar incident in which National Security Adviser Michael Waltz included the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic who was, apparently accidentally, included in a private chat about forthcoming Houthi attacks.
However, White House Spokesperson Karoline Leavitt called the NPR report “total FAKE NEWS” on X and said US President Donald Trump “stands strongly behind” Hegseth.
Hegseth, who worked as a host for Fox News prior to his appointment as Pentagon chief by Trump, lambasted the media for the latest reports and denied any wrongdoing.
“This is what the media does, they take anonymous sources from disgruntled former employees, and then they try to slash and burn people, ruin their reputation. It’s not going to work with me,” Hegseth said at a White House hosted Easter event on Monday.
Farewell to Waltz, Hegseth?
The Washington Post previously reported that the Signal incident infuriated Trump, but he decided not to fire Waltz to avoid giving the “liberal media a scalp.”
The scandal concerning Hegseth, however, is more far-reaching as Pentagon officials loyal to Trump have also turned on their “boss.”
Four senior Pentagon officials have spoken out against Hegseth’s management of the department in recent weeks.
John Ullyot, the former chief Pentagon spokesman, left abruptly last week and later published an opinion piece for Politico, accusing Hegseth of poor leadership.
“It’s been a month of total chaos at the Pentagon. From leaks of sensitive operational plans to mass firings, the dysfunction is now a major distraction for the president – who deserves better from his senior leadership,” Ullyot wrote.
As NPR pointed out, three Pentagon officials, Dan Caldwell, Colin Carroll and Darin Selnick, were also escorted out of the building last week for allegedly leaking information to the press – an accusation they have denied via a joint statement on X.
“All three of us served our country honorably in uniform – for two of us, this included deployments to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And, based on our collective service, we understand the importance of information security and worked every day to protect it,” the statement says, hinting at Hegseth’s purported intel leak.
“At this time, we still have not been told what exactly we were investigated for, if there is still an active investigation, or if there was even a real investigation of ‘leaks’ to begin with,” it adds.
The anonymous nature of NPR’s tip-off means it is currently only speculation at best – but it is not a groundless one. Whether the former Fox News host can cling on to his seat as the US’s top defense official for longer than three months remains to be seen.