Trump’s Defense Pick May Bully His Way to a Senate Confirmation

It looks like bullying works. A frenzy of activity from the most determined MAGA acolytes appears to have moved the dial for some Republican senators who voiced their concerns about confirming television host Pete Hegseth to be the next secretary of defense.

During an interview Tuesday on Newsmax’s Rob Schmitt Tonight, Texas Senator John Cornyn said that he and his fellow Senate Republicans planned to confirm Hegseth.

“I’m supporting Pete’s confirmation, and I believe that ultimately he will be confirmed,” Cornyn said. When asked whether Hegseth had secured the “full support of the party,” Cornyn said he wasn’t aware of any Republican holdouts.

“I know of no one who said they will vote against him,” Cornyn explained, despite previous reports indicating at least six Republican senators opposed Hegseth.

This comes after weeks of MAGA losing it online over any Republican who has shown the slightest bit of reticence about Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Defense Department, or voiced their willingness to do their due diligence about the allegations against Hegseth, who is not only radically unqualified but also accused of excessive drinking and sexual assault.

“What a disgrace. If you’re a GOP Senator who voted for Lloyd Austin, but criticize @PeteHegseth, then maybe you’re in the wrong political party,” Donald Trump Jr. wrote in a post on X last week.

Elon Musk replied, “Yes.”

Iowa Senator Joni Ernst’s reluctance to readily back Trump’s bad pick led to an online firestorm of criticism from MAGA activists, who couldn’t seem to understand why a ​​retired Iowa National Guard lieutenant colonel would vote to confirm Democratic nominees but not a man who made disparaging remarks about how women should not serve combat roles in the military.

“Senator Joni Ernst (R) voted to confirm Lloyd Austin for Secretary of Defense who turned our military into a woke laughingstock but is refusing to say if she will confirm Pete Hegseth,” wrote LibsofTiktok, a prominent far-right troll account on X. “So she supports all this trash but doesn’t support a strong Conservative who will strengthen our military and hold the DC war machine accountable?”

LibsofTikTok was just one among a swarm of MAGA trolls attacking Ernst and threatening to mount challenges to unseat her in the next election.

As a top Trump ally anonymously told Fox News Digital, “It’s really this simple: If you oppose President Trump’s nominees, you oppose the Trump agenda and there will be a political price to pay for that. We are well aware that there are certain establishment Senators trying to tank the President’s nominees to make him look weak and damage him politically, and we’re just not going to allow that to happen.”

At the Reagan National Defense Forum on Saturday, Ernst expressed a desire to hear more from Hegseth.

“I am a survivor of sexual assault, so I have worked very heavily on sexual assault measures within the military, so I’d like to hear a little more about that, and I’d like to hear about the role of women in our great United States military,” she said.

And by Monday, after a second meeting with Hegseth, Ernst seemed to have changed her tune.

Without outright saying she’d support his nomination, Ernst said that she’d had “encouraging” conversations with Hegseth, and said she was supporting Hegseth “through the process,” according to Politico. She also said Hegseth was suddenly “very supportive of women in the military.”

Without holdouts such as Ernst, it’s more likely than not that Hegseth’s nomination will go through. How long he’ll last in Trump’s Cabinet is another matter entirely.

Just shy of 75 million Americans voted against a second Donald Trump presidency—but the Capitol police officers who stood between the forty-fifth president’s supporters and Congress on January 6, 2021, are especially aggrieved.

Former Capitol officer Harry Dunn told MSNBC on Tuesday that the MAGA leader’s election night win felt like a “dagger through the heart.”

“I honestly can say I wish I was surprised,” Dunn said. “This has been four years in the making.”

“I had the opportunity to speak to Michael Fanone today, and he said something, that what we spoke out for was just accountability,” Dunn continued, referring to a fellow ex-officer who defended Congress during the riot. “It was doing what’s right. To see that he skated that, and there are people in this country that prioritized him being president over seeking accountability, it was a dagger through the heart, to be very candid with you.

“Election Night it was like our spirits were crushed because we thought all of our efforts had been in vain,” he added.

Dunn, who served 15 years in the Capitol Police, has claimed that Trump’s supporters attacked him and shouted racial slurs at him on January 6. He was a witness for the House select committee on the January 6 attack, and testified in the seditious conspiracy trial of the Oath Keepers.

In the years following the attack, Dunn tried and failed to win one of Maryland’s House seats, but ultimately used his residual funds to continue his fight against Trump, starting a PAC in June to exclusively support candidates running against Trump’s acolytes.

Trump, meanwhile, has made his loyalty to his most violent and ardent followers clear: On Sunday, he reaffirmed his intentions to free the men and women who rioted through Congress in 2021 on his behalf, forcing the legislature to delay the certification of the presidential election results. In an interview with NBC News’s Meet the Press, the MAGA leader said he would act “very quickly” to release the January 6 defendents—as soon as his “first day” in office.

“They’ve been in there for years, and they’re in a filthy, disgusting place that shouldn’t even be allowed to be open,” Trump said.

He also invited one of the protesters to serve on his transition team.

Trump has nominated Kimberly Guilfoyle for U.S. ambassador to Greece, fueling rumors that her longtime engagement to his son has come to a public end.

“Today, I am very pleased to announce the appointment of Kimberly Guilfoyle as the United States Ambassador to Greece,” President-elect Trump wrote on X on Tuesday. “For many years, Kimberly has been a close friend and ally. Her extensive experience and leadership in law, media, and politics along with her sharp intellect make her supremely qualified to represent the United States, and safeguard its interests abroad.”

The timing of this announcement is intriguing, amid reports of Guilfoyle and Donald Trump Jr. breaking off their engagement. Guilfoyle, 55, and Trump Jr., 46,. have been together since around 2018. But recently, Trump Jr. has been spotted with well-known Palm Beach resident Bettina Anderson, 38, according to The Daily Mail. The outlet posted pictures of Trump Jr. and Anderson walking hand in hand together just hours before the announcement of Guilfoyle’s nomination for U.S. ambassador. This was the third time The Daily Mail had spotted the pair since September. And according to the tabloid, Guilfoyle has known for a while. 

“Kimberly either didn’t know about Bettina—or didn’t want to know. Did she hear whispers that Don Jr. was fooling around with someone else? Probably,” a friend of Guilfoyle told The Daily Mail. “She’s no fool but it’s easy to deceive yourself when you’re so committed to someone and believe he’s committed to you.”

Trump Jr. chimed in on the news of her nomination. “I am so proud of Kimberly. She loves America and she always has wanted to serve the country as an Ambassador,” he wrote on X. “She will be an amazing leader for America First.”

Guilfoyle is a former Fox News anchor who was formerly married to current California Governor Gavin Newsom and CEO Eric Villency before linking herself to Trump Jr. and his father in 2018, serving as a senior campaign adviser in 2020 and 2024. 

Guilfoyle, like many of Trump’s Cabinet nominees, is not without her fair share of controversy and allegations.  

She left Fox News in 2017 after she was accused of exposing herself and showing naked pictures of herself and the men she slept with to an assistant. Fox News settled with the assistant for $4 million. At a fundraiser in 2004, she said that her then husband, Newsom, had a large penis and pantomimed oral sex. In 2019, she offered an event’s top donor a lap dance, and in November 2020, she told fundraising event attendees that Trump Jr. liked it when she dressed up as a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader.

A bankruptcy court has rejected The Onion’s attempt to buy Alex Jones’s media platform Infowars, ruling Tuesday that the process lacked transparency. 

The decision came late at night after two days of proceedings in a Houston courtroom, where Judge Christopher Lopez said, “I don’t think anyone acted in bad faith here.”

“I think everyone was trying to buy an asset and put their best foot forward and play by the rules,” Lopez said, but added that he was troubled over the sealed bidding process overseen by court-appointed trustee Christopher Murray. 

The process “did not maximize value in any way, based on the record before me,” Lopez added. “I don’t think it was enough money.”

Jones celebrated the ruling, telling his followers on X, “A judge followed the law.” The  conspiracy theorist had been relentlessly whining about the sale to anyone who would listen, including right-wing personalities like Steve Bannon, and even had the support of tech billionaire Elon Musk, who sought to protect Infowars’ account on the X platform. 

Global Tetrahedron, which owns the satirical Onion, bought the conspiracy platform at a bankruptcy auction in November. Jones declared bankruptcy after losing a defamation lawsuit from the families of victims of the Sandy Hook school shooting, which his platform repeatedly suggested was staged in some way. 

The Onion’s bid to purchase Infowars was backed by the families of eight Sandy Hook victims, who “agreed to forgo a portion of their recovery to increase the overall value of The Onion’s bid, enabling its success,” according to a statement last month. One day after the auction, though, Lopez paused the acquisition amid complaints from a losing bidder, First United American Companies, which is connected to Jones’s nutritional supplements business.  

In a statement, The Onion’s CEO Ben Collins said it would continue to try and purchase Infowars.

“It is part of our larger mission to make a better, funnier internet, regardless of the outcome,” the statement said.

While many social media accounts belonging to Luigi Mangione, the man charged with murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, have been taken down since he was identified by police Monday, his X account remains online after a brief suspension.

Mangione’s X posts indicate engagement with center-right thought, self-improvement, and pop psychology and critiques of modern technology, consumption, and “wokeness.” Deleted posts from Mangione’s account reported by Business Insider Tuesday shed further light on the 26-year-old’s political views.

According to Business Insider, Mangione reshared a post in which Edward Snowden advocated for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be named the 2024 Democratic presidential nominee. “Darkly amusing to watch panicked dems suddenly searching under the couch cushions for a candidate when kennedy is literally standing right there,” Snowden posted in early July, as Biden faced increasing pressure to drop out amid concerns about his age and mental acuity.

Another post shows that Mangione viewed both Biden and Trump disapprovingly. “Both parties—Trump with his refusal to accept the results of an election, and Biden with his refusal to accept his age and step down—are simultaneously proving how desperately individuals will cling to power,” Mangione wrote in a reply to political writer and analyst Nate Silver, according to Business Insider.

Business Insider also uncovered that Mangione reposted a tweet from a self-described “fascist hipster,” which said: “My experience with the medical profession—and yours is probably similar—is that doctors are basically worthless unless you carefully manage them, and 2/3 of them are worthless even in that case.”

Mangione reportedly suffered from severe back pain and underwent back surgery. His manifesto, published by journalist Ken Klippenstein Tuesday afternoon, condemned companies that he said “abuse our country for immense profit because the American public has [allowed] them to get away with it.”