Trump Team Trying To Blame Hegseth, Gaetz For Its Own Vetting Failures
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As Donald Trump’s cabinet picks of unqualified and alleged sexual predators come under scrutiny, he and his MAGA cronies are doing what the “party of personal responsibility” always does when they screw up: blame others.
Much as you know Team Trump would love to find a way to blame Democrats, the sexual assault allegations against Hegseth are Republican vs. Republican. There doesn’t seem to be a single Democrat to blame for Gaetz’s misconduct, either. So, the next best way to avoid accountability: blame Hegseth and Gaetz for not doing Trump’s job for him.
Via Rolling Stone:
According to four sources familiar with the situation, some top Trump transition officials and others close to the president-elect have been puzzled, if not infuriated, that Hegseth did not preemptively inform them of the allegations against him before they made their way into the press — most notably through the publication of a police report detailing the alleged incident at a hotel in Monterey, California.
“How did he not know? Why didn’t he tell us?” a source close to Trump says. “Pete wasn’t interviewing for a job at McDonald’s; this is the fucking Pentagon! … Even if the allegations are fake, it doesn’t matter because he was supposed to tell us what we needed to know so we could be better prepared to defend him — not learn about it from the media.”
That’s right, Team P***y Grabber, this is the f***ing Pentagon. Why the heck didn’t you do your job and competently vet your own candidate for such an important position?
Apparently, there was some BS show of a vetting process:
There was, the sources say, a vetting process for the Hegseth pick, but it did not uncover these details, nor was it especially invasive. Trump’s transition team did not sign agreements with the White House or the Justice Department to allow the FBI to conduct background checks on the president-elect’s nominees.
“When we ask, ‘Is there anything else we need to know about?’ that is usually a good time to mention a police report,” a Trump adviser says. “Obviously he remembered that this all happened and there is no way — I don’t think — he could have believed this wouldn’t come out once he got nominated.”
Mediaite has more on the Trump effort to blame his own picks for not doing the job he was elected to do (emphases are mine):
President-elect Donald Trump was misled by cabinet nominees Matt Gaetz and Pete Hegseth about the extent of the misconduct allegations against them, according to several sources who spoke with Mediaite.
…
Another source, who served on the Trump campaign, told Mediaite that when Gaetz was confronted about the allegations of sexual misconduct against him he “denied, denied, denied.”
“Trump believed him at face value,” the source said. “Gaetz got caught.”
…
Gaetz was not the only cabinet nominee said to have misled the president-elect. Hegseth, the former Fox News host who is Trump has nominated for Secretary of Defense, was questioned about his past in initial discussions with Trump’s team. A source said Hegseth — who has been married three times and has pursued multiple extra-marital affairs — was asked if there were any scandals from his past and even if he had ever signed a non-disclosure agreement.
“He told the campaign there’s no issues,” said the source. “There’s no assault issues. There’s no NDA. Compounding lies.”
Nice try, MAGA world. But it’s Donald Trump’s job to make sure his cabinet picks are suitable.
While the media gets distracted over the salacious details of Gaetz’s and Hegseth’s alleged sexual assaults (and let’s not forget that serious sexual misconduct allegations have been made about HHS pick, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Education Secretary pick Linda McMahaon), let’s keep the focus on the forest not the trees.
In other words, Trump has already failed miserably in his first presidential acts of the term and he hasn’t even taken office yet.