WASHINGTON (AP) — Pete Hegseth, the Army National Guard veteran and Fox News host nominated by Donald Trump to lead the Defense Department, was flagged by a fellow service member as a possible “Insider Threat” because of a tattoo he and which is therefore linked to white supremacist groups.
Hegseth, who has downplayed the role of military members and veterans in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack and criticized the Pentagon's subsequent efforts to tackle extremism in the ranks, has said that through his unit of the National District of Columbia Guard has been removed from surveillance. Joe Biden's inauguration in January 2021. He says he has been wrongly identified as an extremist because of a cross tattoo on his chest.
This week, however, a fellow Guard member, who was the unit's security manager and part of a counterterrorism team at the time, shared with The Associated Press an email he sent to the unit's leadership showing another tattoo flag used by white supremacists: concerned it was indicative of an 'Insider Threat'.
If Hegseth comes to power, it would mean that someone who has said it is a sham that extremism is a problem in the military would oversee a sprawling department whose leadership reacted with alarm when people in tactical gear stormed the U.S. Capitol steps. military style stack formation. He has also expressed support for members of the military accused of war crimes and criticized the military justice system.
Hegseth and the Trump transition team did not respond to emails seeking comment.
As the AP reported in an investigation published last month, more than 480 people with military backgrounds were charged with ideologically driven extremist crimes between 2017 and 2023, including the more than 230 arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 uprising. and analyzed by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, or START, at the University of Maryland. While these numbers reflect only a small portion of those who served honorably in the military — and Lloyd Austin, the current Defense Secretary, has said that extremism is not widespread in the U.S. military — the AP investigation found that plots involving people with a military background were more serious. mass casualties are likely to occur.
'People who love our country'
Since January 6, Hegseth, like many Trump supporters, has minimized both the seriousness of the riot and the role of people with military training. Amid widespread condemnation the day after the attack, Hegseth took a different approach. In a panel on Fox News, Hegseth portrayed the crowd as patriots, saying they “love freedom” and are “people who love our country” who have “reawakened to the reality of what the left has done to their country.”
Of the fourteen people convicted of seditious conspiracy in connection with the attack on the Capitol, with the most serious charge dating from January 6, eight previously served in the military. While the majority of those with military backgrounds arrested after January 6 were no longer serving, there were more than 20 military personnel at the time of the attack, according to START.
Hegseth wrote in his book “The War on Warriors,” published earlier this year, that only “a few” or “a handful” of active-duty soldiers and reservists had been in the Capitol that day. He did not mention the hundreds of military veterans who were arrested and charged.
Hegseth has argued that the Pentagon overreacted in taking steps to crack down on extremism, and has spearheaded the military's efforts to remove from its ranks people it deemed white supremacists and violent extremists . Hegseth has written that the issue is “fake” and “manufactured” and characterized it as “touting the lie of racism in the military.” He said efforts to root out extremism “have driven ordinary patriots out of their formations.”
“America is less safe, and our generals simply don't care about the oath they swore to uphold. The generals are too busy assessing how domestic 'extremists' wearing Carhartt jackets will take over our 'democracy' with gate barriers or flagpoles,” he wrote in “The War on Warriors.”
In a segment on Fox News last year about Jacob Chansley, a Navy veteran known as the “QAnon Shaman” who walked through the Capitol wearing a horned fur hat, Hegseth played a misleading video clip of his then-colleague Tucker Carlson attempting to portray Chansley as a passive tourist.
In fact, Chansley was one of the first rioters to enter the building and pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of obstructing an official proceeding in 2021. Chansley acknowledged using a megaphone to incite the crowd and thanked him in a prayer while in the Senate chamber was given the opportunity to get rid of traitors and wrote a threatening note to Vice President Mike Pence saying: 'It's only a matter of time. Justice is coming!”
In a Facebook post Hegseth posted with a clip from the video, he wrote that the way Chansley was treated by the legal system is “disgusting.”
“Trump, Chansley and many more… the left wants to lock us all up,” Hegseth wrote.
Support for convicted war criminals
Hegseth served for nearly two decades and was deployed to Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay. He has two Bronze Stars. While speaking about his service and advocating for other service members and veterans, he has taken action to support convicted war criminals and recently said he told his platoon they could ignore guidelines limiting when they can shoot.
In a podcast interview released earlier this month, Hegseth described receiving a briefing from a military lawyer in Baghdad in 2005 on the rules of engagement. Hegseth said the lawyer told them they were not allowed to shoot someone carrying a rocket-propelled grenade unless it was pointed at them.
“I remember leaving the briefing, pulling my platoon together and saying, 'Guys, we're not doing that. You know, if you see an enemy and he, you know, moves before he's able to point his weapon at you and shoot, we've got your back,'' Hegseth said.
“All they're doing is taking one incident and shouting 'war criminal,'” he said, referring to The New York Times, the left and the Democrats, adding: “Why wouldn't we support these guys even if they were not perfect? ?”
He said he was proud of his role in obtaining a pardon from Trump in 2019 for a former U.S. Army commando who was set to stand trial for the killing of a suspected Afghan bomb maker, as well as a former Army lieutenant convicted of murder because he ordered his men. to shoot at three Afghans, killing two. At Hegseth's urging, Trump also ordered the promotion of Eddie Gallagher, a Navy SEAL convicted of posing with a dead Islamic State prisoner in Iraq.
Biden's inauguration
Hegseth has complained about being labeled an extremist himself by the DC National Guard and said he was not allowed to serve during Biden's inauguration, a few weeks after the attack on the Capitol, because of a cross tattoo on his chest. He said he decided to end his military service shortly afterward out of disgust.
But a fellow Guard member who worked as a security guard ahead of the inauguration provided AP with an email he sent expressing concerns about another tattoo.
Retired Master Sergeant. DeRicko Gaither, who served as the D.C. Army National Guard's physical security manager and was a member of its counterterrorism team in January 2021, told the AP that he received an email from a former D.C. Guard member containing a screenshot of a social media post with two photos showing several of Hegseth's tattoos.
Gaither told AP that he had examined the tattoos — including one of a Jerusalem cross and the context of the words “Deus Vult,” Latin for “God wills it” on his bicep — and determined that they were sufficiently connected to extremist groups to justify the take email to the next level. to his commanding officers.
According to Heidi Beirich of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, several of Hegseth's tattoos are associated with an expression of religious faith, but they have also been adopted by some far-right groups and violent extremists. Their meaning depends on the context, she said.
Some extremists invoke their association with the Christian Crusades to express anti-Muslim sentiment. The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism notes that the words were in the notebooks of Allen, Texas, gunman Mauricio Garcia in 2023. Anders Breivik, a right-wing extremist who killed 77 people in 2011, had similar notes in his manifesto.
In an email Gaither sent on Jan. 14, 2021, and provided to the AP, he expressed concerns about Hegseth, a major at the time, mentioning only the “Deus Vult” tattoo. In the email addressed to then Maj. Gen. William Walker, commanding general of the DC National Guard, expressed concern to Gauther that the phrase was being associated with white supremacists who invoke the idea of a white Christian medieval past as well as the Christian Crusades.
“MG Walker, sir, with the information provided, this is in line with Insider Threat and this is what we as members of the United States Military, the District of Columbia National Guard and the Anti-Terrorism/Force Protection Team are trying to prevent,” Gaither said. wrote.
“I said, 'You guys need to take a look at this,'” Gaither said in a telephone interview with the AP on Thursday. “Later I got an email telling him to stay away.”
Biden's inauguration took place just two weeks after the insurrection, and the military was taking no chances. More than 25,000 Guard members poured into the city, each undergoing additional screening depending on how close they would be to Biden.
A total of 12 National Guard members were told to stay home, former Pentagon press secretary Jonathan Hoffman told reporters in a briefing a day before the inauguration. At least two were flagged for potential extremism concerns; the rest were due to other background check issues identified as concerning by the military, FBI or Secret Service. It was not clear whether Hegseth was among the twelve Hoffman referred to at the time.
Hegseth has also speculated in podcast interviews that he was asked to resign because of his political views, his role as a journalist covering January 6 or because he works for Fox News.
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Smith reported from Providence, RI, and Dearen reported from Los Angeles.
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Contact AP's global investigative team at [email protected]
