DUI Hire Pete Kegsbreath Targeting Women and Minorities in DOD

Despite the conflict with Iran and other recent military activity overseas, the Pentagon seems focused on purging minorities and women. Last week, NBC News reported that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had intervened to block or delay the promotions of more than a dozen Black and female senior officers. 

The process within the Army, the Air Force, the Navy and the Marines is structured to ensure the most qualified officers get promoted. Hegseth’s decision to intervene in the process has raised concerns among some officials within those military branches and the White House, the nine U.S. officials familiar with the situation said.  “There is not a single service that has been immune to this level of involvement by Hegseth,” one of the U.S. officials said. 

According to both NBC and The New York Times, some officials are concerned that officers are being targeted because of their race, gender, or perceived political affiliation. In one instance last year, Hegseth’s chief of staff, Ricky Buria, bluntly stated that “President Trump would not want to stand next to a Black female officer at military events,” the Times reported.

Two officials said that among the attributes Hegseth has cited for removing officers from promotions are past support for Covid vaccines or mask mandates for troops, or whether officers were affiliated with DEI programs, or assigned to worke on such initiatives. Those same officials said an officer’s association with former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley (whom Trump still views as a political enemy) can also make an officer who is up for a promotion susceptible to scrutiny from Hegseth’s office.  “There is not consistency being applied to the standards” for promotions, another of the U.S. officials said.

Hegseth blocked three Marine officers (two women and a Black man) who were expected to be promoted or appointed to new roles, despite being recommended by Marine leadership. None of the three Marines were the subjects of internal investigations that might raise concerns about moving forward with their promotions, according to two of the officials.  

Army chief of staff, General Randy George had recently asked to meet with Hegseth to discuss Hegseth's blocking of promotions for some Army officers, which seemed to focus on women and Black men, but Hegseth refused to meet or discuss his decisions, according to two additional U.S. officials.  Soon thereafter, Hegseth fired George instead.  George's term was expected to serve in his position an additional year and a half,  George, the Army’s top officer, was senior military assistant to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin during the Biden administration.  Also during Hegseth’s tenure, several top military officers have been removed, including former Joint Chiefs Chairman CQ Brown Jr., a Black man, and former Chief of Naval Operations Lisa Franchetti, a white woman.

A retired senior military officer described the promotion process as rigorous and said any meddling by the defense secretary could diminish trust in it.  “Our officer corps trusts our promotion process,” the retired officer said, adding that intervention in the process without an explanation “will certainly cast a shadow across our officer corps that everything they have said, done and written about during their careers could be politicized in a career-ending manner with the stroke of a pen.”