Former Fox News host Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s pick to head the Department of Defense, ignored a reporter’s question pointedly asking him: “Do you have an alcohol problem?”
Later, another journalist stopped him in a corridor and pressed: “Were you ever drunk while traveling on the job?”
“I’m not gonna dignify that with a response,” Hegseth responded, adding: “I’m talking to all the senators and I look forward to their discussions.”
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Journalists fired questions as a grim-faced Hegseth walked quickly down a corridor surrounded by supporters to meet with Republicans senators on Capitol Hill on Monday. He also returned to talk to lawmakers Tuesday.
The painful questions come amid mounting witness accounts of disturbing behavior by an apparently intoxicated Hegseth in various situations over the last several years.
Ten former and current Fox employees told NBC News that Hegseth drank to a degree that concerned his colleagues, the network reported Tuesday.
Hegseth’s own attorney said his client was “visibly intoxicated” after speaking at a conference of Republican women in 2017 in Monterey, California, when one of those attending accused him of sexual assault in his hotel room. Hegseth has insisted that the sex was consensual. Police investigated the issue, but did not press charges, and Hegseth paid his accuser an undisclosed sum as part of a nondisclosure agreement, according to his lawyer.
Last week the New Yorker cited witnesses who described Hegseth as clearly drunk when he attempted in the past to join in onstage with topless dancers at a Louisiana strip club. He also drunkenly shouted “kill all Muslims!” in the middle of an Ohio bar in 2015, at a time while he was serving as the president of a veterans’ group, according to the magazine.
CBS News reported that Jessie Jane Duff, a Marine veteran who served as one of Trump’s 2024 campaign executive directors, was among those who pressed to have Hegseth ousted from the head of Concerned Veterans for America in 2016 in part because of his drinking. He was also reportedly forced out of his leadership role in Vets for Freedom after allegations of financial mismanagement, aggressive drunkenness and sexist behavior.
Besides Hegseth’s complete lack of experience running an organization anywhere in the ballpark of the Pentagon, with its massive $800 billion and 2.86 million personnel, critics are voicing increasing concerns about his apparent problem with alcohol — as well as his treatment of women.
The New York Times last week revealed a bombshell email to Hegsmith from his own mother to him in 2016, berating him during his second 2018 divorce as a long-time “abuser of women.”
The various controversies are threatening to derail his bid to become secretary of defense.
“We got a process where he can be asked questions. The articles I’ve read, yeah, some of them are concerning,” said Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham .
“I don’t know if it’s true or not, but he’ll go through the process,” he added. “He’ll be asked about it. We’ll see what happens.”
