A staffer placed by Elon Musk inside the Department of Defense played a key role in the firing of three top aides that has thrown the agency into upheaval.
Justin Fulcher was installed in the Pentagon as the lead staffer for the Department of Government Efficiency, and four sources familiar with the episode say he suggested that warrantless surveillance conducted by the National Security Agency (NSA) had identified the alleged leakers Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was trying to root out of the department early in his tenure, reported The Guardian.
"Fulcher offered to share the supposed evidence as long as he could help run the investigation, three of the people said," The Guardian reported. "But when he sat down with agents over a week later, it became clear he had no evidence of a wiretap, and the Pentagon had been duped."
Investigators eventually debunked his claims, but Hegseth’s personal lawyer Tim Parlatore had already told President Donald Trump about “smoking gun” evidence incriminating the aides. The defense secretary swiftly fired senior adviser Dan Caldwell, deputy chief Darin Selnick and the deputy secretary’s chief of staff Colin Carroll.
That created a leadership void filled by former junior military aide Ricky Buria, who Hegseth trusts but other administration officials consider a liability, and the White House is having trouble attracting qualified candidates to fill those vacant positions.
"Looking back on the chain of events, three people familiar with the conversations described Fulcher’s claims as conveniently dovetailing with prevailing suspicions at the time about Caldwell printing lots of documents and his efforts to have the leak investigation shut down," The Guardian reported.
Even a quick look at his NSA claims should have shown them to be false, because Pentagon investigators concluded right after the firings that there had been no authorized or unauthorized wiretap through the NSA – but those allegations were passed along to Hegseth and the White House as accurate.
Fulcher, who was replaced by Musk in April as the Pengaton's lead DOGE staffer, said the account presented to The Guardian was not accurate and denied suggesting there were NSA wiretaps.
“I never approached Parlatore, [Hegseth’s then chief of staff Joe] Kasper or anyone else offering ‘surveillance evidence’ and did not ask to join an investigation on that or any other basis,” Fulcher said.