Image-obsessed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth cosplayed as a NASA pilot in his latest photo op as he visited the Kennedy Space Center on Monday.
Hegseth, 45, also got chummy with Jeff Bezos, 62, while touring the billionaire’s Blue Origin rocket factory.
The Fox News host-turned defense secretary, who would like to be called Secretary of War, took a joyride aboard a Northrop F-5 Tiger II military jet flown by new NASA administrator Jared Isaacman.
Photos posted by Isaacman, the 42-year-old billionaire owner of the jet, show Hegseth flashing hand gestures at the camera as he sits in the passenger seat of the jet. Hegseth went full Star Wars for the photo op, sporting a Rebel Alliance emblem on his flight helmet—the faction that took on the tyrannical Galactic Empire in the franchise.
“Thank you Jared. No doubt you are going to Make NASA Great Again,” Hegseth wrote as he reshared the photos on X. “And together, we will ensure the @NASA - @DeptofWar Partnership is stronger than ever. I’ll fly with you any day!”
Isaacman, an ally of Elon Musk, was confirmed by the Senate in December, after President Donald Trump withdrew his nomination in May, only to bring it back in November.
After taking flight with Hegseth, he wrote on X that the two “share a common goal of American superiority in the ultimate high ground of space,” and touted NASA’s Artemis program as “America’s return to the lunar environment.”
Hegseth isn’t the first from the Trump orbit to play passenger princess on Isaacman’s jet. Earlier this month, Eric and Lara Trump, the president’s son and daughter-in-law, rode shotgun on the NASA chief’s jet over Florida’s Kennedy Space Center.
In a video posted by the Defense Department, Hegseth is seen shaking hands with Bezos after arriving at Blue Origin, the Amazon billionaire’s space flight company, which is involved in the Artemis program.
“Welcome! It’s an honor to have you,” Bezos said.
Hegseth delivered remarks at the factory, stressing the need for “American space dominance” and saying the U.S. must “dominate the ultimate high ground,” NewsNation reports.
The defense secretary, who has been accused of war crimes over the Trump administration’s strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean, was accompanied in Florida by his omnipresent wife, Jennifer Rauchet.
