President Donald Trump has never been known as a loyal boss. One day he praises his cabinet picks in public, and the next he goes completely off script to embarrass them on live television. When Trump humiliates someone in front of the cameras, Washington has learned to read the signs. Pete Hegseth is the latest target, and the suspicion that he is being set up as the scapegoat for the Iran war is growing louder by the day.
Just ask Kristi Noem, the former Homeland Security secretary who was fired by Trump after a string of public missteps and a disastrous congressional hearing. She was axed without warning, and her departure sent a clear message to everyone still sitting around the cabinet table. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is now finding himself in that very same position.
At a White House Cabinet meeting on Thursday, March 26, Trump took a strange and very public jab at Hegseth that left political observers stunned. Trump appeared to be praising his Defense Secretary on the surface, but his words carried a sharp and unmistakable edge underneath.
“He will be fired within a month,” one viewer predicted after watching the exchange unfold in real time.
Trump opened by calling Hegseth a natural fit for the job. “Pete Hegseth, who was born for this role. I mean, he’s doing a great job,” the president said. But the praise quickly turned into something far more unsettling.
Trump then cryptically referenced an unnamed person who had given Hegseth “a very hard time.” He told the room, “I’ll tell you, somebody came up to me yesterday, gave you a very hard time, said, ‘You know, I made a mistake.’” A visibly uncomfortable Hegseth squirmed beside him as Secretary of State Marco Rubio quietly looked the other way.
“Ah… Marco and Pete have the sads today,” one eagle-eyed viewer noted on social media.
Trump kept going, drawing out the moment for maximum effect. “So, when I tell you who, you’re not even going to believe it. He said he gave you such a nasty hard time,” he continued. He then patted Hegseth on the arm like someone consoling a nervous puppy, adding, “But you’re doing, you’re doing great.”
“He’s soft launching throwing him under the bus,” another viewer wrote, capturing the mood perfectly.
This was not the first time Trump has used Hegseth as a convenient lightning rod for the Iran war. Just days earlier, on March 23 at an event in Memphis, Tennessee, Trump publicly suggested that Hegseth was the one who pushed for the military strike. “Pete, I think you were the first one to speak up. And you said, ‘Let’s do it,’” Trump told the crowd, placing the origin of the war directly on his Defense Secretary’s shoulders.
The Iran conflict has now entered its fifth week. It has left 13 Americans dead, dozens more injured, and killed over 2,000 Iranians, many of them civilians. Trump’s poll numbers on both his personal approval and his handling of the war have fallen sharply, and the political pressure to find someone to blame is intensifying fast.
The calls for Hegseth’s removal are no longer coming only from Democrats. Massachusetts congressman Seth Moulton revealed on MS Now that Republican lawmakers have been privately pushing for Hegseth’s ouster for weeks. “Behind the scenes, Republicans cannot wait to get rid of this guy,” Moulton said, declining to name names.
“Many of them are on the Armed Services Committee, but the point is none of them will say it in public. None of them have the courage to say any of this in public,” Moulton continued. “They’re totally cowed by Donald Trump and that’s just so pathetic,” he added bluntly.
Hegseth’s credibility problems did not start with the Iran war. His tenure at the Pentagon began with SignalGate, a national security scandal in which he shared sensitive military information in a group chat, and national security adviser Michael Waltz accidentally added a journalist to the thread.
A new report from government watchdog group Open Books added even more fuel to the fire. The watchdog revealed that Hegseth burned through a staggering $93 billion in a single month last September, with much of the spending having nothing to do with national defense. The Pentagon reportedly spent $2 million on Alaskan king crab, $6.9 million on lobster tails, and $15.1 million on ribeye steak. Between March and October of last year, more than $7 million went to crab purchases alone.
With the Iran war deepening, poll numbers cratering, and a growing list of scandals attached to his name, Pete Hegseth looks less like a cabinet secretary and more like a man being quietly prepared for the exit. And if history inside the Trump White House is any guide, the exit rarely comes with a warning.
