WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ripped the “hoax press” and blamed recently fired aides “spinning” lies for the turmoil now engulfing the Pentagon on his watch — vowing in a Fox News interview Tuesday morning that all persons found to be leaking sensitive US military plans will be referred to the Justice Department for prosecution.
“When that evidence is gathered sufficiently — and this has all happened very quickly — it will be handed over to DOJ, and those people will be prosecuted if necessary,” Hegseth told “Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade.
“We don’t think, based on what we understand, that it’s going to be a good day for a number of those individuals because of what was found in the investigation,” he said.
United States Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth attends the 2025 Easter Egg Roll with his family on the South Lawn of the White House on April 21, 2025 in Washington, D.C. Samuel Corum – Pool via CNP / MEGA“The leakers know who they are, and we know over time the truth will be told, and we stand firm behind that.”
The Pentagon chief added that the probe is seeking to uncover who may have divulged operational plans for the Panama Canal as well as who shared details about a private briefing with tech billionaire Elon Musk to go over war preparations against China — which President Trump himself nixed after The New York Times reported on it, according to Axios.
Hegseth also confirmed that several key Defense Department staffers, including senior adviser Dan Caldwell, deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick, chief of staff to the deputy defense secretary Colin Carroll and top spokesman John Ullyot had been let go as a result of the initial probe’s findings.
Military veterans and family members of active-duty troops gather in the Loop to call for the resignation of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on March 27, 2025 in Chicago, Illinois. Getty Images“We identified there was sufficient evidence,” he said, before taking a swipe at Ullyot — who penned a scathing op-ed in Politico calling for President Trump to fire Hegseth — in particular: “Anybody that knows John knows why we let him go.”
Ullyot left the Defense Department after being sidelined for playing a role in the removal of an official webpage celebrating MLB trailblazer Jackie Robinson.
“He did some good work up front, then he was moved along and asked to move along,” Hegseth said. “We did right by him. We tried to help. He’s spinning it otherwise. It’s too bad. It’s politics, I guess.”
“I don’t have time for leakers. I don’t have time for the hoax press that peddles old stories from disgruntled employees,” he added of the ousted aides.
“We should be talking about the decimation of the Houthis, how we’re pushing back the Chinese, how we have a new defense area at the southern border.”
Caldwell denied that he had made any unauthorized releases of military information to any journalists in an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Monday.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and his wife Jennifer Rauchet attend the annual White House Easter Egg Roll event, on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., April 21, 2025. REUTERS“If I actually did some of the things that anonymous people on the internet and in the Pentagon are saying I did, I’d be in handcuffs,” he said.
Hegseth side-stepped questions about his own disclosure of classified material in a private text chat that reportedly included family members — as well as his inadvertent sharing of US airstrike plans against Houthi militants in Yemen last month with Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg.
“I said repeatedly, ‘No one’s texting war plans,’” he told Kilmeade. “What was shared over Signal, then and now, however you characterize it, was informal, unclassified coordinations, for media coordination, other things.”
“Those folks who were leaking, who have been pushed out of the building, are now attempting to leak and sabotage the president’s agenda and what we’re doing,” Hegseth also said. “And that’s unfortunate, it’s not what I do. It’s not how we operate.”
Former national security officials previously told The Post that the Houthi strikes were “about an ongoing mission” and “classified” — even if the plans discussed weren’t labeled “top secret.”
Hegseth had communicated key details and timestamps for the March 15 strikes with Goldberg — who was accidentally added to the Signal chat by National Security Adviser Mike Waltz — and other cabinet officials, according to screenshots that the Atlantic later published.
The disclosures have since been referred to the Pentagon’s inspector general as part of a full investigation of Hegseth’s conduct.
When that evidence is gathered sufficiently — and this has all happened very quickly — it will be handed over to DOJ, and those people will be prosecuted if necessary,” Hegseth said. diy13 – stock.adobe.comAccording to The Times, “essentially the same attack plans” — including the flight schedules for the F/A-18 Hornets targeting the Houthis — were forwarded to the secretary’s wife, Jennifer Rauchet, and brother, Phil Hegseth, who serves as a senior adviser in the Pentagon.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt batted down an NPR report Monday suggesting that Trump was looking for potential replacements for Hegseth following the slew of leaks, ripping the story as “total FAKE NEWS based on one anonymous source who clearly has no idea what they are talking about.”
“As the President said this morning, he stands strongly behind @SecDef,” Leavitt posted in a statement on X.
But Ullyot in his Politico broadside hinted at “even bigger bombshell stories coming this week” from inside the Defense Department, where he said he had lived through a “month from hell” under Hegseth’s leadership.
