The Trump transition team is standing firmly behind Pete Hegseth, the nominee for defense secretary, in the face of new allegations that he mismanaged finances, engaged in sexual misconduct, and would get belligerently drunk while serving as the head of two nonprofit veteran organizations.
“So, when it comes to Pete Hegseth, there aren’t any concerns, and we feel very good about his positioning for being confirmed by the Senate,” President-elect Donald Trump senior adviser Jason Miller told CNN on Tuesday.
The New Yorker published an article on Sunday based on a whistleblower’s seven-page report detailing numerous allegations against Hegseth while he served as the president of Concerned Veterans for America from 2013 to 2016. Among those allegations include accounts of Hegseth having to be restrained while attempting to get onstage with strippers at a strip club in Louisiana, sexually pursuing women in the organization, and dividing them into “party girls” and “not party girls.” At the time, he was married to his second wife.
Hegseth’s lawyer Tim Parlatore denied the allegations.
“All false and the New Yorker was fully informed of that before they published their false hit piece,” Parlatore said in an email to the Washington Examiner.
While serving as the leader of Vets for Freedom, Hegseth also took responsibility with donors for putting the organization nearly $500,000 in debt just less than two years into his time as head of the organization. Donors became privy to funds being used to fund parties and “trysts.”
Upon the revelation that Hegseth entered into a settlement agreement with a woman who accused him of sexual assault in 2017, Trump stood by his choice of Hegseth. However, the transition team was reportedly blindsided by the settlement agreement.
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On Monday, Hegseth sat down with senators one on one as part of the confirmation process. Miller said they are taking the confirmation process very seriously.
“That’s because the Senate takes it so serious to go and have the one-on-one meetings, to have these confirmation hearings, to give senators the chance to kick the tires and get some of these questions answered on their own,” Miller said.
