RE-PETE-ING HISTORY

Republican Says Trump Goon Made Same Fatal Mistake as ICE Barbie

A GOP senator says Pete Hegseth is following a former Trump Cabinet member down a familiar path to the chopping block.

A Republican senator has drawn a damning parallel between embattled Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and ousted Trump Cabinet member Kristi Noem.

North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, whose withering grilling of Noem in the Senate preceded her firing as DHS secretary in March, warned Friday that Hegseth had made the same mistake that ultimately cost her the job.

“@PeteHegseth, cabinet secretaries shouldn’t be wasting taxpayer dollars on campaign style videos. Kristi Noem learned that the hard way,” the 66-year-old Republican senator, who is retiring in January, wrote in an X post.

“This is about you: the incompetence you’ve displayed, the bad advice you’ve given to president, and your shameful and embarassing [sic] episodes from firing our top generals to texting war plans to reporters.”

On Thursday, Hegseth, 46, posted an unhinged video in which he sucked up to Donald Trump while patting himself on the back, amid mounting reports that the president is considering giving him the boot.

“It’s all about the politics of personal destruction. Didn’t work against President Trump, and it won’t work with me. You can rest assured of that,” the former Fox host declared in a slickly produced five-minute video, which appeared to be professionally made, standing beside a “Department of War” sign and staring down at the camera from an elevated position.

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Hegseth defended the Iran war as a “historic effort,” repeatedly lavished praise on Trump, and kept circling back to his culture-war grievances in his slam poetry-like delivery that is frequently mocked by SNL’s Colin Jost.

“We will stand. We will fight. And we will defend this republic from all enemies, foreign and domestic,” he said.

While Hegseth may have hoped his video would persuade Trump and other Republicans to keep him in the job, Tillis sees echoes of the self-aggrandizing DHS commercial that helped bring down Noem.

Noem’s $220 million ad campaign, which featured her riding horseback at Mount Rushmore, and her subsequent defense of the spending at Senate hearings reportedly rubbed Trump the wrong way and contributed to his decision to show her the door.

Under intense grilling from Republican Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy in March, Noem testified that the president was aware of the campaign and its hefty cost.

Trump claimed, however, that he didn’t know about the cost. Noem was out two days later.

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Following the GOP’s midterm catastrophe, Trump has been privately polling advisers on whether to dump Hegseth following the GOP’s midterm losses, but has yet to make up his mind, according to reports. Trump has often solicited allies’ feedback before firing officials, suggesting Hegseth’s days in the role could be numbered.

Republican lawmakers and allies are reportedly eager to line Hegseth up as the fall guy for voters turning against Trump over his quagmire war on Iran, according to CNN, arguing that he played a key role in persuading the president to attack Iran despite lacking a clear plan or exit strategy.

GOP Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky said he plans on introducing an impeachment bill next week, and multiple GOP sources told CNN it would likely pass. Democrats have also signaled their intention to aggressively investigate Hegseth when they take power.

The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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