Lindsey Graham: 'Very disturbing' reports on Pete Hegseth make confirmation 'difficult'

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) warned that it would be "difficult" to confirm former Fox News weekend co-host Pete Hegseth as President-elect Donald Trump's defense secretary.

Graham told CBS News correspondent Scott MacFarlane that recent allegations about Hegseth's treatment of women and alcohol abuse would complicate his confirmation hearings.

"I think some of these articles are very disturbing," the South Carolina Republican said. "He obviously has a chance to defend himself here, but some of this stuff is it's going to be difficult."

In 2017, police in Monterey, California, investigated Hegseth after a woman accused him of sexual assault. A police report indicated that the woman went to a hospital after believing she was assaulted at a Republican women's conference.

Hegseth told officers that he had sex with the woman and insisted it was consensual, according to a police report. The two eventually settled out of court.

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In an email released by The New York Times, Hegseth's mother called him "an abuser of women."

"That is the ugly truth and I have no respect for any man that belittles, lies, cheats, sleeps around, and uses women for his own power and ego," she wrote in 2018, according to the report.

Hegseth was also reportedly forced out of leadership roles at two veterans organizations due to drunkenness and sexist behavior, according to The New Yorker.