'Straight-up lying': Armed Services Dem alarmed by Hegseth's 'unhinged' scandal defense

Embattled defense secretary Pete Hegseth has been making the rounds to defend himself from the spiraling Signalgate scandal, and a House Armed Services Committee Democrat sounded the alarm over his conduct.

The defense secretary blamed "disgruntled former employees" for the revelations that he conducted military planning over a non-secure chat app, but Rep. Pat Ryan (D-NY) was not reassured by Hegseth's explanation or the way he delivered it.

"The last two interviews he did, honestly, he seems. borderline unhinged, which in and of itself is deeply concerning," Ryan said. "I mean, we heard over the weekend and last week MAGA loyalists, Hegseth supporters, say the Pentagon is in, quote, 'total chaos,' and while that might feel like an 'inside baseball' process story, this affects troops in harm's way, men and women in uniform. I served 27 months in combat myself."

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"The effect on morale, the effect on safety, the American people, regardless of political party, rightly have demanded accountability on this, and yet we're seeing, with one exception, which I give a lot of credit to, to [Rep.] Don Bacon (R-NE), my colleague, total silence and a bizarre defense of now a second leak of clearly classified sensitive information," Ryan added.

Hegseth continues to insist the war plans were not classified, but Ryan said that simply isn't true.

"We have to call this out, and I don't use this word lightly – he is straight-up lying," Ryan said. "They are straight up lying. This has gone from a screwup to a coverup, now a second round of it, and we're learning more and more and more, and I'm hearing from folks that I know in the Pentagon who are nonpartisan folks that, like, this is really the tip of the iceberg. I mean, we saw senior folks resigning in significant ways last week. We saw essentially the top spokesperson write a public op-ed defending Trump, but saying Hegseth needs to go. That's pretty unprecedented."

"Will Donald Trump, who made his reputation for quote, unquote, 'firing people,' actually fire this guy and make our country safe again and really support our troops?" Ryan added. "That's what every American should be asking."

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