Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin appeared before the Senate for a confirmation hearing where he was confronted over suggesting he had “smelled war” despite having never served in the military.
When the Oklahoma lawmaker suggested he could not talk about his overseas trip because it was “classified,” he later became worked up while being grilled by both the committee’s chairman and ranking member over his mysterious travel.
Chairman Rand Paul even suggested he could delay the committee’s confirmation vote set for Thursday until the reasons for Mullin becoming tight-lipped were resolved.
Ranking Member Gary Peters first raised the line of questioning while quoting Mullin back to his face after a Washington Post report raised questions about Mullin bragging about “special assignments.”
Peters quoted Mullin once saying on Fox News: “War is ugly. It smells bad. If anybody has ever been there and been able to smell the war that’s happening around you, and taste it, and feel it in your nostrils and hear it, it’s something you will never forget.”
He also noted Mullin once claimed he did “special assignments” outside the Defense Department.
The Michigan Democrat asked Mullin point-blank if he’d ever traveled to a foreign country before joining Congress for anything other than vacation with his family. The Oklahoma senator said he had not.
The admission led to some confusion, which had to be clarified. He had left the country for work other than vacation, but it was while he was a member of Congress.
Peters asked Mullin, a former MMA fighter and plumber, if he’d ever worked for the State Department or Defense Department as an employee or volunteer or any other U.S. agency. The senator said no.
Mullin jumped in to “clear up” what he called a misunderstanding. he said he was asked to train “with a very small contingency and go to a certain area.” He indicated it was 2015/2016 when he was serving in the House.
“I spoke in general about my experiences, but I’ve never spoken specifically on details, on dates, or on the mission. and that was official.”
He said it was a classified trip, so he could not go into the details.
Peters, moments later, asked him: “So where did you ‘smell war’?”
“Sir, I’ve just said that this was classified, and the dates, locations and mission,” Mullin insisted, claiming he never spoke about specific details.
The confusing exchange and Mullin’s tight-lipped answers came after a series of reports ahead of his confirmation to replace outgoing DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, that the 48-year-old lawmaker had given a series of vague comments suggesting he had been to war zones.
It raised questions as the senator had never served in the military despite repeatedly alluding to being in war zones while being clear he never wore the uniform.
But the explanation that his travel while serving in the House was classified did not sit well with Peters, who brought it up again later in the hearing.
The ranking member noted he had never heard anything about Mullin’s classified travel until the hearing and raised questions about how unusual it was. He suggested Mullin could share more about it by speaking to them in a SCIF, or secure area.
But during the back-and-forth, Mullin became worked up, insisting he could not talk about it and was not sure what he could divulge, even to lawmakers privately.
Paul chimed in to ask if Mullin had ever worked for the CIA, which he said he had not.
The Oklahoma lawmaker only revealed it was a “special program inside the House,” but he was also not on the House Intelligence Committee at the time. According to him, there were only three or four people on the trip, and he was not authorized to talk about it, and he would not say if it was to a war zone.
Paul appeared skeptical about a “top secret” program while Mullin was serving on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
In the end, they planned to discuss it in a SCIF, or secure area, on Wednesday afternoon.
Before serving in the Senate, Mullin was a member of the House for a decade. Before that, he grew his family’s plumbing business and had a brief stint as an MMA fighter.
A spokesperson for the senator conceded in response to Axios reporting before the hearing that he “has participated in CODELs [Congressional Delegations] in his official capacity to represent the United States abroad, advance U.S. national security interests, and strengthen our allied partnerships.”
While serving as a member of the House in 2021, Mullin was part of an attempted rescue mission of Americans in Afghanistan after suicide bombers attacked Kabul’s airport, killing 13 U.S. service members. The Washington Post reported that a wild plan to eject Americans was knocked back by both the Biden administration and other countries close to Afghanistan.
“They would never let us in Afghanistan,” Mullin complained on Fox News after the failed operation.
