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Does It Look Like Pete Hegseth Still Has a Chance to Be Trump's Secretary of Defense?

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  December 09, 2024 4:15 PM

Ever since President-elect Donald Trump selected Pete Hegseth as his nominee for Secretary of Defense almost a month ago, there's been plenty of chatter about the former Fox News host and Bronze Star recipient. The reaction was swift and often severe, with many on the left attacking Hegseth from multiple angles at once. At one point, it looked like Hegseth's nomination was doomed, with the chatter focusing on replacement nominees. But, it's a new week, and Hegseth has doubled down on staying in this fight. So, have his chances gone up?

Throughout Monday, Hegseth's chances, according to Polymarket, have been above 50 percent. That's a far cry from less than a week ago when his chances were at a low of 11 percent on December 4. His chances had been in the teens throughout last week. 

At one point, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) confidently made a rather bold claim about Hegseth's chances, specifically how long he'd stay in the fight before he was no longer in consideration. 

While speaking to reporters last week on Capitol Hill, Blumenthal claimed that he had spoken to 5-10 Republicans opposed to Hegseth's nomination. Although, as a reporter mentioned, none had come out publicly to oppose the pick.

He also offered that he'd "be surprised if we're still talking about Hegseth at the end of the week or by Monday." Well, on this Monday, Hegseth's chances are up again once more. 

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Reports came in last week of how Trump was considering replacing Hegseth with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) as the nominee, who has his own impressive military career and was of course one of Trump's main primary foes for the 2024 Republican primary. DeSantis went on to drop out in January and endorse Trump and even spoke at the RNC in July. 

Even with low numbers in the markets and these reports, Hegseth still maintained that he was sticking it through, so long as he had Trump's support, which he does. Those accounts affiliated with the Trump transition team and incoming administration have continued to post support for Hegseth on social media.

What was behind these low chances and such concerns? The mudslinging against Hegseth has been extreme. As Townhall has been covering, Hegseth has been referred to as a "white supremacist" for his Christian tattoos, which is something of an old criticism, given that he wrote about this in his book, "The War on Warriors," released in early June, but one that has resurfaced with a vengeance.

It continues to resurface, given that POLITICO Magazine just last Friday put out a piece titled, "Pete Hegseth's Crusade to Turn the Military into a Christian Weapon." The post has since received close to 5,000 replies on X, with Brett T. at our sister site Twitchy covering some of the best responses. 

Then there's all of the chatter about how Hegseth paid a woman a settlement after she made accusations against him of sexual assault, though that is certainly not an admission of guilt. 

There are concerns about how he supposedly drinks too much, though it's anonymous sources at Fox News saying so, supposedly Hegseth's co-workers, though others willing to go on the record have vehemently rebutted such claims. 

Hegseth has told senators during their meetings in recent weeks, unprompted, that he won't drink. Further, as The Federalist's Mollie Hemingway pointed out about the chatter surrounding Hegseth, people might not truly be concerned about his drinking and affairs.

Rather, as Hemingway pointed out, people "just pretend to care when anonymous allegations can be weaponized against a political opponent."

When it comes to Republican senators who may be opposed to Hegseth's nomination, at the center of a potential holdup has been Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), whom Hegseth met with earlier today. 

The statements put out by Hegseth and Ernst started out positive and only became more so from there.

Another sign of confidence comes from Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), who will serve as the Republican Conference Chair, who posted on Monday morning on X, as well as shared with "Fox & Friends," that he's confident Trump's Cabinet picks will have full support from Republicans. Cotton's confidence has become a trending topic on X for Monday afternoon. 

It's worth reminding that of all the unqualified picks that President Joe Biden nominated for his Cabinet, with equity at the center of it, none of them received "no" votes from Biden's fellow Democrats. Even Republicans voted for Biden's picks. For this upcoming Congress, Republicans will have a 53-47 majority in the Senate when the 119th Congress starts in less than a month. It's time for them to get on board. 

Regardless, it looks like Blumenthal is eating plenty of crow over his bold prediction about Hegseth's chances.