Hegseth Puts His Foot In His Mouth Up To The Thigh On Classified Information

Y’all, HAHAHAHA Petey Boy tried to fumble his way through an interview including about protecting classified information and failed miserably! We all *know* he didn’t (hello SignalGate 1 and SignalGate 2) but “The lady (or man, right?) doth protest too much, methinks” (from Shakespeare’s play Hamlet). Aw, yea. I’m not sure he’s going to get away with this one. From Steve Benen on MSNBC:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth covered a fair amount of ground in his latest interview with his former Fox News colleague, Will Cain, and the beleaguered Pentagon chief acknowledged that he’s received a lot of criticism since joining the White House Cabinet. In fact, he even suggested he should “get a medal” because journalists have reported on his many failures.

But of particular interest were his comments about the one criticism that apparently bothers him. Hegseth: “There’s a reason why our nation’s most closely held secrets are contained in certain places with only access from certain people. Nobody takes that more seriously than me.”

Riiiiiight. Nice try, but I think even MAGA, at this point, knows better. It’s too late for damage control. And again, I ask, what the h*ll is it with him taking his wife everywhere, including to meetings with classified information? Or with him when he was being questioned by the committee for the position? Or with him when he was being questioned by the Senate? That’s creepy in SO many ways. Sorry, I rambled. More from MSNBC:

“There’s a reason why our nation’s most closely held secrets are contained in certain places with only access from certain people,” the former Fox News personality said. “Nobody takes that more seriously than me.

“If there’s one thing I’ve sort of been offended by — I don’t get offended by much; I’m here to do my job for the president, for the country — is this idea that I don’t take classification or I don’t take clearances seriously. Nobody takes it more seriously than me.”

I, your writer, think this sentence is very important because he obviously does NOT take it seriously.

I can appreciate why Hegseth is eager to defend himself, especially on a network his boss watches, but all things considered, this was a subject he probably should’ve avoided.

I agree. He should have stayed far, far away from this one. He’s in a big enough mess as it is. We all know the basic elements of the SignalGates. That’s all extremely public, and the surprise is that no one else in the conversation of the first one seems to have gotten the attention that Petey Boy did. He just keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper. Even more from Steve Benen:

The final paragraph of Jeffrey Goldberg’s piece in The Atlantic on the fiasco read, “All along, members of the Signal group were aware of the need for secrecy and operations security. In his text detailing aspects of the forthcoming attack on Houthi targets, Hegseth wrote to the group — which, at the time, included me — ‘We are currently clean on OPSEC.’”

“OPSEC” refers to “operations security.” In other words, the defense secretary was certain that he and his colleagues — while chatting on a free platform that has never been approved for chats about national security or classified intelligence — had locked everything down and created a secure channel of communication.

Of course, we now know that Team Trump was most certainly not “clean on OPSEC,” Hegseth’s embarrassing boast notwithstanding.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Oh, so stupid. Why can’t he just admit his screwup, take the heat, and let the interest die away into news archives? Remember what I said about digging himself into a hole? I hope he put a ladder into it because he’s not going to be able to get out of it any other way. But wait! There’s more, from Steve, again on MSNBC:

As brutal as those revelations were, they were soon followed by a series of related controversies. The Wall Street Journal reported in late March, for example, that Hegseth brought his wife — who does not have a security clearance — “to two meetings with foreign military counterparts where sensitive information was discussed.”

The Journal also reported that Hegseth used the Signal messaging app for official Pentagon business more extensively than had been previously disclosed, “engaging in at least a dozen separate chats.”

Then, a few weeks ago, the Journal also reported that the Pentagon inspector general was investigating Hegseth’s “sharing of military plans to a second Signal chat that included his wife and brother.”

Lock him up! Lock him up! (Sound familiar?) Well, I’ll settle for punting him out of his position and getting in someone who *knows* what they are doing. Does Agent Orange think this reflects back on him well? Does tRump still think he was a good choice? Anyone else would have taken action by now. You notice El Presidente Imbécil has been Very Quiet through all of this. To close, one last comment, from Steve Benen on MSNBC:

It was against this backdrop that Hegseth told a national television audience that “nobody” takes the protection of classified information “more seriously” than he does. Among the many unsettling angles to this incident: The defense secretary managed to deliver the line with a straight face.

Yup. That says it all right there. It says it all. Thanks for sticking with me!