The top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), on Tuesday tried to give President-elect Donald Trump’s Secretary Nominee Pete Hegseth different rules for his confirmation hearing than Biden’s Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin had for his.
Reed asked committee Chairman Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) if there could be a second round of questions from committee members to Hegseth.
Wicker rejected his request, saying, “I think we’re going to have adequate time for questioning,” adding, “We’re following the exact same precedent on all things that we did with Secretary Austin.”
Reed also asked for Hegseth’s FBI background investigation report to be shared with all members of the committee, despite the precedent being the report only going to the chairman and ranking member.
Again, Wicker denied his request, saying, “What I intend to do is follow the exact precedent for the last two hearings for secretary of Defense [and] that was for the chair and the ranking member to see the report. That is my intention.”
On Monday, Punchbowl News reported that Hegseth’s FBI investigation — a customary step for top presidential nominees — came back “unremarkable.”
The outcome dashed Democrat hopes that it would come back flawed and could be used as evidence that his nomination was problematic.
Reed claimed that the FBI check was “insufficient.”
Republican strategist Andrew Surabian responded to Reed’s complaint:
“Let me translate what Jack Reed means when he claims that the FBI Report about @PeteHegseth is ‘insufficient.’ That’s code for: We’re mad that we didn’t find anything bad in there.”
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