Bombshell video shows Hegseth warned Trump not to expect troops to follow illegal orders

Panelists on "CNN This Morning" were flabbergasted by unearthed criticism of Donald Trump by Pete Hegseth from nearly a decade ago.

Hegseth, now the secretary of defense, insisted as a Fox News host in 2016 that then-candidate Trump was wrong for suggesting that military lawyers and commanders would violate the laws of war if he ordered them to kill the families of terrorists or revive banned forms of torture.

“They won’t refuse,” Trump told Fox News anchor Bret Baier when asked about the topic during a Republican presidential debate. “They’re not going to refuse me — believe me.”

Hegseth at the time cast doubt on whether Trump would back up his commanders if they followed those orders, and noted the campaign pivoted to what he considered an unrealistic position.

"The military is not going to follow illegal orders, and so the Trump campaign was forced to change their position and say, we're going to try to change the law so that the military can operate within the law," Hegseth said at the time. "That's a tall order also."

Panelists were momentarily silent after hearing Hegseth's comments, which they agreed was eerily prescient in light of the current scandal over Hegseth's alleged "double-tap" order against survivors of a missile strike off the coast of Venezuela — and a furor surrounding a video featuring Democrats reminding service members that they had no duty to follow illegal orders.

"That's fascinating," said Democratic strategist Maria Cardona. "That isfascinating."

"Very relevant to the moment,I think," agreed host Audie Cornish.

"I think it also underscoreswhat so many Democrats' concernswere when Hegseth was goingthrough his confirmationhearings, which is his lack ofexperience," Cardona continued. "Not his lack of experience on TV."

"Well, obviously this is goingto be played a lot over the nextyear," added Republican strategist Ashley Davis. "But, I mean, obviouslyit's going to be differentsituations. I just don't know.Going back to the midterm,though, I just want to [say] I don'tknow if this is what's going tochange anyone's mind. It'sgoing to be the economy, it'sgoing to be the kitchen table.But it is a constantconversation."

CNN's Edward-Isaac Dovere disagreed, saying the issue was more important to voters than Davis suggested.

"What it comes down to isfundamental question of who canthe government just decide tokill, and based on what?" Dovere said. "Whichare on these sorts of questionsin a lot of people's minds, whocan the government just decideto arrest and take away? Theseare things that Donald Trump ischanging our conceptions of ... and that's why it's beyondthe the legal justificationstuff and the political, andthese are people were killed andwe don't know why they werekilled, and the governmenthasn't explained it."

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