U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered purges within the Pentagon as a result of an inquiry into leaks divulging top-secret military plans to the media.
However, one of the men who resigned from the Pentagon refuted that narrative in an op-ed.
Donald Trump Jr., the eldest son of President Donald Trump, responded to the Politico story by calling the man a “traitor.”
John Ullyot, who has worked in different positions for President Donald Trump since joining his 2016 campaign, claimed in Politico that Hegseth’s firings were a ruse to conceal severe “disarray” within the Department of Defense. The former spokesperson of the Pentagon quit last week.
“Hegseth’s team has developed a habit of spreading flat-out, easily debunked falsehoods anonymously about their colleagues on their way out the door,” he wrote in Politico.
The op-ed was shared on X by Alex Burns, a senior editor with the outlet, and was quoted by Trump Jr.
“This guy is not America First. I’ve been hearing for years that he works his ass off to subvert my father’s agenda. That ends today. He’s officially exiled from our movement,” wrote the first son early Monday morning.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt denied a report from NPR that Trump is looking to replace Hegseth as Secretary of Defense.
The White House has been embroiled in a dispute about information security when The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, seemed to be inadvertently added to a group chat with multiple key Trump officials planning a strike on the Houthis on Signal.
In April, a similar scandal occurred when Hegseth, according to the New York Times, allegedly discussed specifics of a March military operation against Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen in another Signal messaging conversation with his wife and brother.
On Monday, NPR reported that despite these concerns, “The White House has begun the process of looking for a new secretary of defense, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to speak publicly.”
The NPR story was revised to reflect that Leavitt had called it “fake news.”
“This @NPR story is total FAKE NEWS based on one anonymous source who clearly has no idea what they are talking about,” the White House spokeswoman wrote. “As the President said this morning, he stands strongly behind @SecDef.”
The White House’s official “Rapid Response” account on X shared a post slamming the report as well, claiming “Lies from NPR — which, as we all know, is a Fake News propaganda machine.”
This is the second time recently that Trump has clarified that he’s standing by Hegseth, as some Democrats have called for him to resign because of a leaked Signal chat that contained information about a military strike in Yemen.
Last month, the president discussed the controversy following Hegseth’s accidental transmission of details about the strike to members of the administration in a Signal chat, which also included Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic. Goldberg published the full messages.
After several Democrats in Congress called for Hegseth to step down because of the scandal, reporters asked Trump if he thought Hegseth might want to resign.
“Hegseth is doing a great job, he had nothing to do with this. Hegseth. How do you bring Hegseth into this?” Trump replied.
Trump also acknowledged that his White House national security advisor, Mike Waltz, took responsibility for mistakenly adding Goldberg to the Signal chat.
“Mike Waltz … he claimed responsibility, I would imagine. It had nothing to do with anyone else. It was Mike, I guess, I don’t know, I was told it was Mike,” Trump said when asked about the investigation.
Trump again played down the controversy over whether or not Hegseth shared secret information that could have put the operation at risk by focusing on the mission’s success.
“There was no harm done because the attack was unbelievably successful that night,” Trump said.
