US Republican Rep. Thomas Massie said Wednesday that he will reintroduce articles of impeachment against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth unless Hegseth steps down.
“There is one contingency in which I won’t reintroduce the articles of impeachment: Hegseth resigns,” he wrote on the US social media platform X.
Massie told CNN that he plans to trigger the vote in the House of Representatives when Congress returns next week. Multiple Republican sources told the network they expect it to pass.
“You don’t screw up this badly an election with just one issue,” Massie told CNN. “It was completely avoidable if they’d just broken out of the cultish following of (President) Donald Trump.”
According to CNN, citing White House officials, Trump has told aides that Hegseth should fight back against impeachment efforts and any investigations into his decision-making.
Trump on Wednesday dismissed reports that he was considering replacing Hegseth, telling reporters that the defense secretary was “doing a very good job.”
Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell was quoted as saying that Hegseth “will not back down or be deterred by politicians seeking to score partisan points.”
“Secretary Hegseth is 100% committed to leading the Department until the end of President Trump’s term in office,” Parnell added.
Vice President JD Vance said earlier Wednesday that the reason Republicans lost the midterm elections is the Iran war.
