Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth faces a week of difficult encounters on Capitol Hill, with senior Republican senators openly questioning his judgment on personnel and warning that a pattern of abrupt firings has destabilized the Pentagon at a precarious moment for American national security.
Hegseth is scheduled to meet this week with senior members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, a session originally set for last week but postponed after senators held a late-night voting session on the budget. He will also testify Wednesday before the House Armed Services Committee. Both appearances come after a string of high-profile dismissals that have rattled even lawmakers who voted to confirm him.
The core concern, as The Hill reported, is straightforward: Republican senators who backed Hegseth's nomination now say he is making poor leadership calls at the Defense Department, and several told the outlet he would not win confirmation if the vote were held today. Anonymous GOP senators said they would like to see Hegseth "move on," though they acknowledged the decision belongs to President Trump.
The flashpoint for much of the frustration is the ouster of Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George in early April. Media reports indicated Hegseth pushed George to resign. The move drew immediate rebukes from Republicans on the Armed Services Committee, not marginal backbenchers, but members with direct oversight of the military.
Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), chair of the Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities and a combat veteran herself, did not mince words:
"I have the greatest admiration and respect for Gen. Randy George. He's probably one of the finest officers the United States Army has ever produced. It was a mistake for Secretary Hegseth to dismiss him."
Ernst added that she had no idea why George was let go: "As far as the reason for his dismissal, I wouldn't even begin to know what it was." That absence of explanation has become a recurring complaint. One anonymous Republican senator told The Hill that George's departure was the tipping point, saying the "hollowing out of incredible leadership at the Pentagon has been a big concern."
Even Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, described as a longtime friend and aide to Vice President Vance, called George "an amazing, transformational leader" during testimony before the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee this month. Driscoll was reportedly in North Carolina when George was asked to resign, and Under Secretary of the Army Michael Obadal was also away from Washington, raising questions about whether the decision bypassed the Army's own civilian leadership chain. Driscoll told lawmakers that "the civilian leadership, the design of our system, is that they get to pick the leaders that they want, and we execute on those orders."
House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) called George's ouster "a real loss":
"I just want the record to reflect how much we regret, I personally regret, at least, he's no longer in active service. He's a real loss to us, in my opinion."
The forced retirement of the Army's top general fits a broader pattern. Hegseth has also fired Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. C.Q. Brown, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti, Defense Intelligence Agency director Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse, and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. James Slife.
The dismissal of Navy Secretary John Phelan this past week added a new layer of unease. Phelan had been making the rounds on Capitol Hill, meeting with key Republican lawmakers, when he was abruptly terminated.
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), who chairs the Armed Services Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, said the firing caught him by "surprise." Rounds noted that Phelan "had been making appointments with all of us" and that senators assumed "he was simply making house calls to touch base with all of us with the National Defense Authorization Act coming through." Rounds added: "Don't know a whole lot more about it and hopefully we'll find out more."
A second anonymous GOP senator told The Hill that the Phelan situation compounded the damage: "Driscoll is pretty well-regarded here and so that's turning some heads. The fact this feud continues to go on is unhelpful to Hegseth."
The broader concern on Capitol Hill is not that a defense secretary should never fire anyone. It is that Hegseth appears to be removing respected leaders without clear rationale, without coordinating with Senate-confirmed civilian counterparts, and without explaining himself to the lawmakers who hold the Pentagon's purse strings. The refusal to explain certain firings has become a pattern that frustrates even sympathetic Republicans.
Perhaps the most damaging criticism comes from Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who cast a pivotal vote for Hegseth during his Senate confirmation last year. Tillis told The Hill that Hegseth is "missing the mark on personnel" and has "separated some of the most extraordinary generals that we've had in play." He said plainly: "I don't quite know what's going on there."
Tillis framed the problem as one of scale and experience. Hegseth, he said, previously managed "30 or 40 people." Now "he's got an organization that's much larger, much more complex than anything he's done." Tillis gave Hegseth what he called "a failing grade" and drew a comparison to another Trump appointee who struggled:
"In some respects, maybe not as extreme, but in some respects he's displaying the exact lack of experience that got [former Homeland Security Secretary] Kristi Noem in trouble."
That comparison carries weight. Trump has already tapped Markwayne Mullin to take over the Department of Homeland Security and Todd Blanche to serve as acting U.S. attorney general, moves that signal the administration is willing to make changes when Cabinet members falter. Earlier Republican defections from Hegseth had already put him on thin ice before this latest wave of criticism.
Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell defended the personnel moves in a statement to The Hill, framing them as part of a necessary reform effort:
"Out of respect for uniformed officers, the Secretary does not comment on the nature of their departure. But we all serve at the pleasure of the President, and the President and the Secretary deserve officers who fully and expeditiously embrace the priorities, policies, and objectives of this Administration."
Parnell added: "It is extremely difficult to reform a department, particularly a department the size of DoD, with the same personnel who were a part of previous priorities. Necessary changes have been made and will continue to be made."
That argument has allies. National security adviser Mike Waltz publicly defended Hegseth on Fox News, framing the shake-up as accountability: "And whether it's leaks, or not getting the job done, or failures in terms of procurement acquisition, now you have a leader that's in charge. And I couldn't be prouder of Pete Hegseth." The Defense Department has announced several senior advisers to replace departed employees, suggesting the administration is moving to stabilize the office rather than abandon Hegseth.
But the reform argument runs into a credibility problem when the people being removed are praised by the administration's own appointees. Driscoll called George transformational. Cole called his departure a real loss. Ernst called him one of the Army's finest. If these were dead-weight holdovers blocking reform, the administration's own team did not seem to know it.
The personnel upheaval is not the only source of pressure. Hegseth barely won Senate confirmation in the first place, prevailing 51, 50 with Vice President JD Vance casting the tiebreaking vote. National Review noted that in mid-April, multiple top Pentagon aides were pushed out or resigned, including spokesman John Ullyot, adviser Dan Caldwell, deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick, staffer Colin Carroll, and chief of staff Joe Kasper.
The earlier Signal-chat controversy, in which Hegseth posted details of U.S. strike plans against the Houthis, has also not fully dissipated. Newsmax reported that a second Signal group chat called "Defense Team Huddle," which included 13 people, among them Hegseth's wife Jennifer and his brother Phil Hegseth, contained similar warplane launch times. Current and former officials said such pre-strike operational details would have been classified and could have endangered pilots. The matter is now under inspector general scrutiny.
House Democrats have filed impeachment articles against Hegseth, though that effort carries little practical weight in a Republican-controlled chamber. The more consequential pressure comes from within his own party.
Even on policy questions unrelated to firings, Hegseth is generating friction with Senate Republicans. He announced last week that service members will no longer be required to get flu vaccine shots. Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) called the decision "a mistake."
Wicker drew a sharp distinction between the flu shot and the COVID vaccines that became a flashpoint during the Biden era:
"I don't equate them with COVID shots, which were largely experimental and had not stood the test of time. When I was on active duty and a reservist, I dutifully took my flu shot every year. And as a whole, it made for a healthier" armed forces.
When the chairman of your own party's defense committee publicly calls your policy decision a mistake, the political ground beneath you is shifting.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who voted against Hegseth's nomination, said she was "shocked" by George's firing and described traveling with him: "I've never been so impressed by a military general. This guy knows what's going on." She added that "people are wondering what's going on over there" and warned: "We're in the middle of a war. We got to know that things are being managed" well. Her summary was blunt: "So, not good."
Some Senate Republicans worry that other key generals may be pressured to retire this summer. The broader debate over whether Pentagon promotions and firings are being politicized shows no sign of cooling.
Hegseth's meetings this week on Capitol Hill will test whether he can offer the explanations and reassurances that senators have been demanding. The fact that even senators who voted for him are now grading him as failing tells you how far the goodwill has eroded.
Reform is a worthy mission. But you cannot reform an institution by firing everyone your own allies call indispensable, and then refusing to say why.
