Trump’s Defense Pick Refuses to Answer One Very Easy Question

Donald Trump’s pick for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, refused to answer whether or not he’d undergo an expanded FBI background check, at his confirmation hearing on Tuesday.

“I assume you’d be willing to submit to an expanded FBI background check that interviews your colleagues, accountants, ex-wives, former spouses, sexual assault survivors, and others?” Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal asked the embattled defense secretary nominee.

“Senator, I’m not in charge of FBI background checks,” Hegseth replied tersely.

“But you would submit to it and support it?”

“I’m not in charge of FBI background checks,” Hegseth repeated before taking a sip of water.

Hegseth has submitted to an FBI background check, but it disturbingly did not include interviews with his ex-wives or any of the women who accused him of sexual assault, according to several people who spoke with NBC News. A more thorough background check could shed more light on allegations that Hegseth has vehemently denied at his hearing—sexual assault, alcoholism, financial fraud, and more. It makes sense that Hegseth pleaded the Fifth.

The MAGA fight to dissolve the Education Department is on.

North Carolina Representative David Rouzer introduced legislation in the House on Monday to eradicate the agency. H.R. 369, titled “To provide for the elimination of the Department of Education, and for other purposes,” was subsequently referred to the House Committee on Education and Workforce.

Ridding the country of its national education system will follow through on one of Donald Trump’s boldest and most Project 2025–inspired campaign promises. Other components of Trump’s agenda are quietly dependent on generating extra cashflow that the elimination of the Department of Education could (barely) muster. A major plan is extending Trump’s 2017 tax plan, which overwhelmingly benefits corporations and could add as much as $15 trillion to the national deficit.

Republicans in favor of the extension have mused over several potential cuts to help offset that massive expenditure, including nixing the Department of Education. That would save some $200 billion from the deficit—while simultaneously dismantling the nation’s education system, which already is drowning under the pressure of historically low teacher salaries and scant resources, particularly in low-income regions. The federal government provides 13.6 percent of funding for public K-12 education across the nation.

Trump himself has said that his Department of Education plan involves handing the reins and lofty responsibilities of public school administration over to parents, who famously have all the time in the world to oversee educational curricula while simultaneously working jobs and raising their children.

During a rally in Milwaukee in October, the MAGA leader promised that his vision for the nation’s educational system would involve very limited oversight from any government, including the states’.

“I figure we’ll have like one person plus a secretary,” the soon-to-be forty-seventh president said at the time. “You’ll have a secretary to a secretary. We’ll have one person plus a secretary, and all the person has to do is, ‘Are you teaching English? Are you teaching arithmetic? What are you doing? Reading, writing, and arithmetic. And are you not teaching woke?’”

He also openly admitted that the plan would, unfortunately, be to the detriment of a great swath of states—particularly poorer ones in the middle of the country.

Pete Hegseth’s confirmation hearing for defense secretary Tuesday was interrupted three separate times less than 10 minutes into his personal statement. Four protesters were removed from the room.

“You are a misogynist.… Not only that, you are a Christian Zionist!” the first protester yelled while Hegseth spoke of his vision for the Defense Department.

Another protester wearing pink was dragged out, followed by two more. Senator Roger Wicker called for security to remove them.

Donald Trump posted a furious rant Tuesday over the release of Jack Smith’s damning report detailing the president-elect’s alleged efforts to subvert the results of the 2020 election.

In the sweeping 170-page report, which summarized Smith’s investigation and interviews with more than 250 individuals, the former special prosecutor dismissed allegations that he was politically influenced as “laughable.” He asserted that if not for Trump’s election in November, “the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial” on the charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights.

Trump melted down in a rant on Truth Social posted in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

“Deranged Jack Smith was unable to successfully prosecute the Political Opponent of his ‘boss,’ Crooked Joe Biden, so he ends up writing yet another ‘Report’ based on information that the Unselect Committee of Political Hacks and Thugs ILLEGALLY DESTROYED AND DELETED, because it showed how totally innocent I was, and how completely guilty Nancy Pelosi, and others, were,” Trump wrote, referring to the now-defunct bipartisan House committee that investigated the January 6 riot.

“Jack is a lamebrain prosecutor who was unable to get his case tried before the Election, which I won in a landslide,” Trump added. “THE VOTERS HAVE SPOKEN!!!”

Of course, the voters don’t determine guilt; a jury does.

House Republicans have previously claimed that the committee hid evidence undercutting Cassidy Hutchinson’s claim that Trump lunged for the steering wheel of his SUV to try and steer himself toward the Capitol on January 6—a claim that no one else backed up, including the driver of the SUV. The driver did say that Trump was “insistent on going to the Capitol.” House Republicans have also alleged that essential testimony about Trump’s activities that day were deleted. Despite the fact that those responsible for the investigation have insisted this claim is false, Trump has repeatedly claimed the deleted files would have exonerated him.

Trump wasn’t quite done: He also seemed pissed about the timing of the report.

“To show you how desperate Deranged Jack Smith is, he released his Fake findings at 1:00 A.M. in the morning,” Trump wrote in a separate post. “Did he say that the Unselect Committee illegally destroyed and deleted all of the evidence.”

Special counsel Jack Smith did not hold back in his final report on the investigation into Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election.

While much of it contains information already made public, such as the fake electors schemes from Trump’s cronies and the pressure placed on then–Vice President Mike Pence, Smith made some powerful statements regarding the criminal charges against the president-elect. For example, Smith flat-out said the evidence would have been enough to convict Trump, had he not been reelected.

The Department’s view that the Constitution prohibits the continued indictment and prosecution of a President is categorical and does not turn on the gravity of the crimes charged, the strength of the Government’s proof, or the merits of the prosecution, which the Office stands fully behind. Indeed, but for Mr. Trump’s election and imminent return to the Presidency, the Office assessed that the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial.

Smith spelled out Trump’s culpability, calling out his efforts to subvert the election, nullify the result for Joe Biden, and put himself back in the White House.

“As alleged in the original and superseding indictments, substantial evidence demonstrates that Mr. Trump then engaged in an unprecedented criminal effort to overturn the legitimate results of the election in order to retain power,” the report states.

Smith defended himself from attacks from the right, who claim that his investigation was politicized or influenced by the Biden administration.

“While we were not able to bring the cases we charged to trial, I believe the fact that our team stood up for the rule of law matters,” Smith wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland in a letter included with the report. “I believe the example our team set for others to fight for justice without regard for the personal costs matters.”

Smith also called out Trump’s attempts to attack and undermine the investigation, noting that a “significant challenge” for the counsel’s team was Trump’s “ability and willingness to use his influence and following on social media to target witnesses, courts, prosecutors.” Ultimately, Smith’s office sought a gag order for the case.

“Mr. Trump’s resort to intimidation and harassment during the investigation was not new, as demonstrated by his actions during the charged conspiracies,” Smith said.

The report arrives less than a week before Trump is sworn into office, and came after a last-ditch appeal from the president-elect to his favorite judge, Aileen Cannon, to prevent its release. She declined late Monday night, and the report was subsequently released.

Read the full report here.