The sooner the Pentagon chief and the rest of the Trump administration move on from this fiasco, the better off everyone will be.
After a judge sided with Mark Kelly, what happens to Pete Hegseth’s crusade?
The sooner the Pentagon chief and the rest of the Trump administration move on from this fiasco, the better off everyone will be. Pete hegseth is another little trump bitch.
— Donna898 (@donna-f898.bsky.social) 2026-02-14T18:01:28.412Z
https://www.ms.now/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/after-a-judge-sided-with-mark-kelly-what-happens-to-pete-hegseths-crusade
In mid-December, the Pentagon announced that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was “escalating” his crusade against Sen. Mark Kelly, launching an “official Command Investigation” into the Arizona Democrat. It was, as The Washington Post noted soon after, an
“unprecedented use of the military justice system to investigate a political adversary.”.....
If the former Fox News host had his hopes up, he has reason to be disappointed. MS NOW reported:
A federal judge temporarily blocked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday from censuring Sen. Mark Kelly or reducing his military pension over a video reminding troops to ‘refuse illegal orders.’
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon’s preliminary injunction prevents Hegseth from taking those actions or reducing Kelly’s rank as a retired Navy captain.
“Secretary Hegseth relies on the well-established doctrine that military servicemembers enjoy less vigorous First Amendment protections given the fundamental obligation for obedience and discipline in the armed forces,” the George W. Bush-appointed jurist wrote in his 29-page opinion.
“
Unfortunately for Secretary Hegseth, no court has ever extended those principles to retired servicemembers, much less a retired servicemember serving in Congress and exercising oversight responsibility over the military,” the judge added. “This Court will not be the first to do so!”.....
Hegseth’s failure dovetails with one of his former Fox colleagues, Jeanine Pirro, who’s currently the top federal prosecutor in the nation’s capital,
authorizing prosecutors this week to try to persuade a grand jury to indict Kelly and his congressional colleagues on charges of seditious conspiracy.
That didn’t go well: Regular citizens on the grand jury rejected the ridiculous gambit on Tuesday. In fact, MS NOW confirmed that literally zero members of the grand jury were inclined to go along with the partisan scheme.
The sooner Hegseth and the rest of the Trump administration move on from this fiasco, the better off everyone will be.
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