Transcript: MAGA Rages as GOPers Quietly Move to Sink Pete Hegseth
Sargent: And you’ve got Elon Musk potentially waiting in the wings to threaten any Republican who dares challenge the MAGA agenda or doesn’t absolutely act as a mindless robotic rubber stamp for Trump, hitting them with primaries that will be backed by an avalanche of Musk money. Now, I don’t know how real that is, but these Republican senators are facing a situation where if they exercise any independence against Donald Trump in any way, they’re potentially facing threats of violence, enormous sums of Musk money behind primary challenges and what have you. Of course, there’s the Twitter propaganda machine also, which will be put to use full throttle against anyone who dares get in Donald Trump’s way.
Gertz: Yeah. It’s worth pulling back a second because this is not a fight over some mid-level government position. This is the Pentagon. This is a position that oversees more than three million United States service members, as well as civilian officials, as well as a budget of hundreds of billions of dollars a year. Pete Hegseth is not remotely qualified for that position. This is a position that goes to heavy hitters, generals, people who’ve worked in the Pentagon for a long time, U.S. senators with long records overseeing the Department of Defense. And Trump is trying to hand it off to someone whose TV hits he likes, because he appreciates the propaganda that Pete Hegseth provides for him. If Republican senators are really going to kneel on that one, it’s really hard to imagine where they won’t.
Sargent: When you step back, it’s absolutely mind-blowingly crazy. This is a guy who engaged in serial infidelities allegedly, bouts of insane public drunkenness, including reportedly chanting kill all Muslims. His own mother had to vouch for him after an email from her saying that he had serially abused women. All of a sudden, the MAGAworld is deciding to make this the hill that they’re going to require Republican senators to die on. And it’s the Pentagon. It’s an amazing turn in what’s happened to the right.
