The suspected drug traffickers, the lone survivors of a U.S. airstrike, were sprawled on a table-size piece of floating wreckage in the Caribbean for more than 40 minutes. They were unarmed, incommunicado, and adrift as they repeatedly attempted to right what remained of their boat. At one point, the men raised their arms and seemed to signal to the U.S. aircraft above, a gesture some who watched a video of the incident interpreted as a sign of surrender. Then a second explosion finished the men off, leaving only a bloody stain on the surface of the sea. Footage of the two men’s desperate final moments made some viewers nauseated, leading one to nearly vomit.”It was worse than we had been led to believe,” one person told us.
The video was part of a briefing that Admiral Frank “Mitch” Bradley, the head of U.S. Special operations Command, gave lawmakers yesterday about the September 2 attack. Bradley told legislators that, after consulting military lawyers, he authorized the follow-on strike, judging that the men still posed a threat as of what they could have done: radioed for help or been picked up with what remained of their cargo of suspected cocaine. The video suggested they didn’t actually do any of that, but Bradley defended his decisions in the first episode of the Trump administration’s newly militarized counternarcotics campaign.
Republicans and Democrats who watched the grainy footage drew different conclusions about whether Bradley’s actions were justified. But manny also sounded exasperated that onc again they were dealing with controversy sparked by Bradley’s boss, secretary of Defense pete hegseth.And after 10 months of turbulence under Hegseth’s leadership, the Republican-led Congress is now showing signs of exercising its oversight powers.
Hegseth has denied reports that he issued a verbal “no quarter” order-that is, an order to kill, not capture-in the September 2 attack, an assertion backed by Bradley. Hegseth also defended Bradley’s decision to launch a second strike-while insisting he wasn’t a part of it. But the congressional scrutiny is likely to continue, deepening the former Fox News host’s reliance on the one person responsible for his political rise: President Donald Trump.So far, Trump continues to profess support.But he, too, is starting to tire of the scandals surrounding Hegseth and does not push back when others suggest Hegseth is not up for the job, an outside adviser to the White House and a former senior administration official told us. Trump has not been happy that a number of Republicans on Capitol Hill are using Hegseth’s record as a reason to stand up to the White House, a further sign of cracks in what had until recently been unwavering GOP fealty to Trump. Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina publicly rejected hegseth’s claim that he had been “exonerated” in Signalgate, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota declined, when asked, to offer his endorsement of Hegseth’s performance.As one senior administration official summed it up: “Rough week for pete.”
As taking office, Hegseth has had few defenders in internal White House deliberations.
Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans
In March, a bizarre series of events unfolded that revealed a startling security lapse within the Trump administration. I, along with a handful of journalists, was inadvertently added to a Signal group chat containing sensitive military plans. The group,intended for a small circle of trump loyalists,included Kash Patel,a former Pentagon official,and Sebastian Gorka,a former deputy assistant to the president.
The messages detailed potential responses to attacks on U.S. forces in the Middle East, including specific targets and timelines.It was a shocking breach of protocol, and a clear indication of how casually classified facts was being handled. The inclusion of journalists-apparently accidental, as the administration claimed-only amplified the severity of the situation. (Patel inadvertently added Jeffrey Goldberg to the group.)
An investigation by the Pentagon’s inspector general revealed that Sebastian Hegseth, a conservative media personality and Pentagon official, was central to the leak. Hegseth had been sharing classified information via Signal, a messaging app not approved for government use, with individuals outside of official channels. The inspector general concluded that Hegseth could have put U.S. personnel and the mission at risk by his actions, even though the mission was completed. The report also found that Hegseth, as the pentagon’s senior official, had the authority to declassify the sensitive information as he transmitted it-in effect declassifying it in his own head-but noted that the attack details had been classified when they were relayed to him by U.S. Central Command. The report also faulted Hegseth for violating his own department’s policies by using Signal for Pentagon business.
As Hegseth was busy attempting to declare exoneration from a report that clearly suggested otherwise, he was sued by The New York Times over his October decision to bar reporters from working inside the Pentagon unless they agreed to restrictions that could prevent reporters from publishing information not approved by the administration, conditions that journalists and First Amendment lawyers broadly agree represent an ostentatious attack on Americans’ basic constitutional protections.
It’s not as though hegseth was widely adored until this week. He alienated many in Trump’s orbit all the way back in the presidential transition, when they believed he was being misleading about parts of his professional and personal history that later came to light in the media and in his contentious confirmation hearings. Susie Wiles, now the president’s chief of staff, groused to aides that she could never tell if Hegseth was telling the truth.
When Signalgate broke, in March, Trump called a number of his close allies to take their temperature on whether he should dismiss Hegseth. Some suggested he be fired, but Trump opted against it. He and his inner circle wanted to avoid the constant staff turnover of Trump’s first term. They have largely stuck to that “no scalps” policy so as not to give the Democrats a win-or the media a major story-by appearing to bow to pressure. (Waltz lost his post as national security adviser but was given a soft landing as ambassador to the United Nations.) Hegseth never regained the trust of some in the West Wing.
Read: Pentagon report: Hegseth risked endangering troops with Signal messages
In the past week, Trump has been far more focused on immigration-a crackdown on migrants from Afghanistan after the shooting of two National Guard members, and the dangers Trump claims Somalis pose in Minnesota-than the controversies around Hegseth, one of the outside advisers and a White House official told us. But some have begun to urge the president, whose poll numbers are slumping, to do a staff shake-up after hitting the one-year mark next month, which could include firing Hegseth. Others point to the need to protect the president from Hegseth.
“At the end of the day, people may forget who P
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