“You’re Not Qualified, Mr. Hegseth”: When Tammy Duckworth SILENCED War Chief | Old Clip Resurfaces

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and also Secretary Mattis had to have this waiver as well. Thank Mr. Hegseth, this hearing is about whether you are qualified to be Secretary of Defense, and one of the qualifications, to answer my colleague's question, is to actually win the votes of every member of this committee and to be confirmed by the United States Senate. And you need to convince us that you're worthy of that vote, because the people of the state of Illinois voted for me to be their senator you. so that I could cast that vote when it comes to picking who is going to be. the next Secretary of Defense. This hearing now seems to be a hearing about whether or not women are qualified to serve in combat and not about whether or not you are qualified to be Secretary of Defense. And let me just say that the American people need a SecDef who's ready to lead on day one. You are not that person. Our adversaries watch closely during times of transition. And any sense that the Department of Defense that keeps us safe is being steered by someone who is wholly unprepared for the job. puts America at risk, and I am not willing to do that. With that in mind, Mr. Hegseth, I want you to try to explain to the American people, this committee, who have to vote for you, and to our troops who are deployed around the world, why you are qualified to lead the Department of Defense. We already know that you've only led the largest 200-person organization. We already know that you so badly mangled a budget that after you left, they had to bring in a forensic accountant. To figure out what went wrong. And the largest budget you ever managed was about $18 billion. You know, that is about 51,560 times fewer, lower than the Department of Defense budget of $825 billion. $16 million is 51,560 times smaller than the defense budget. Please describe to me, Mr. Hegseth, you talk about DOD passing an audit. Please describe to me a time or an organization when you, that you led, underwent an audit. Because you say you're going to hire smarter people than you to run this audit. I'm not asking you to be an accountant. I want you to be able to tell me what kind of guidance will be given to those employees, what will happen if, whether or not you pass that audit. Have you led an audit of any organization, yes or no? I don't want a long answer, yes or no. Have you led an audit of any organization of which you were in charge? Senator, in both of the organizations I ran, we were always completely fiscally responsible for the money that we had. Yes or no, did you lead an audit? And the way my leadership has been stated has been completely mischaracterized. Yes or no, did you lead an audit? Yes or no. What are you afraid of? You can't answer this question. Yes or no, did you lead an audit? Do you not know this answer? Senator, every part of my leadership of these organizations has been misrepresented from top to bottom. Yes or no, did you lead an audit? I will take that as a no. What were the findings? There were no findings because you've never led an audit. What guidance did you give? The auditors, none, because you've never led an audit. Nobody expects you to be an accountant, Mr. Hexath. What we expect is for you to understand the complexity of this Pentagon budget process that is absolutely necessary to outfit our warfighters. Look, the Secretary of Defense is required to make quick decisions every single day that, well, with high-level information that's being provided for them. A Secretary of Defense has to have breadth and depth of knowledge. Right now, I am concerned that you have neither. Mr. Hextech, what is the highest level of international negotiations that you have engaged in, that you have led in? Because the Secretary of Defense does lead international security negotiations. There are three main ones that the Secretary of Defense leads and signs. Can you name at least one of them? Could you repeat the question, Senator? Sure. What is the highest level of international security agreement that you have led? And can you name some that the Secretary of Defense would lead? There are three main ones. I have not been involved in international security arrangements because I have not been in government other than serving in the military. So my job has been to lead men and women in combat. So no, the answer is no, but you named one of the three main ones that the Secretary of Defense signed. You're talking about defense arrangements. I mean, NATO might be one that you're referring to. Status of Forces Agreement would be one of them. Status of Forces Agreement. I've been a part of teaching about Status of Forces Agreements inside Afghanistan. But you don't remember to mention it? You're not qualified, Mr. Hexath. You're not qualified. You talk about repairing our defense industrial complex. You're not qualified to do that. You could do acquisition and cross-servicing agreements, which essentially are security agreements. You can't even mention that. You've done none of those. You talked about the Indo-Pacific a little bit, and I'm glad that you mentioned it. Can you name the importance of at least one of the nations in ASEAN and what type of agreement we have with at least one of those nations? And how many nations are in ASEAN, by the way? I couldn't tell you the exact amount of nations in that, but I know we have allies in South Korea and Japan and in AUKUS with Australia, trying to work on submarines with them. Mr. Hexer, none of those countries are in ASEAN. None of those three countries that you've mentioned are in ASEAN. I suggest you do a little homework before you prepare for these types of negotiations. Listen, Mr. Hexer, this is... We ask our troops to go into harm's way all the time. We ask them to go into harm's way. And this behind me is a copy of the Soldiers' Creed, a copy that usually hangs over my desk here in the Senate. And you should be familiar with it. It's the same copy that hung over my desk at Walter Reed every single day that I woke up and fought my way back because I wanted to go back and serve next to my buddies who saved my life. This same copy, these words, I repeated over and over and over again. And let me read out two things to you, two sentences. I will always place the mission first. And I am disciplined, physically and mentally tough, trained and proficient in my warrior task. Mr. Hegseth, our troops follow these words every single day. And they man up and they pack their rucksacks and they go to war. And they deserve a leader who can lead them, not a leader who wants to lower the standards for himself or raising the standards for other people. And by the way, our troops already meet the standards. We asked troops to man that ship, fight that fire, fly that helicopter until their very last breath. breath and they do that every single day. They cannot be led by someone who's not competent to do the job. How can we ask these warriors to train and perform the absolute highest standards when you are asking us to lower the standards to make you the Secretary of Defense simply because you are buddies with our President-elect? And by the way, he has filed for bankruptcy six times. I'm not quite sure he's the kind of CEO you want to refer to as a successful businessman. Let me make You can't seem to grasp that there is no U.S. military, as we know it, without the incredible women that we serve. Women who've earned their place in their units. You have not earned your place as Secretary of Defense. You say you care about keeping our armed forces strong and that you like that our armed forces are meritocracy. Then let's not lower the standards for you. You, sir, are a no-go. Subscribe to One India and never miss an update. Download the OneIndia app now.