MAGA breathed a sigh of relief after Donald Trump pulled off an offensive against Iran without his defense secretary betraying his plans.
“GREAT JOB, [Secretary Pete] Hegseth!” one conservative user posted to X, along with a Fox News clip of a network reporter saying: “There were no leaks. Nobody speaking about this. A complete blackout on information about Iran at the Pentagon for the last few days.”
“Not a single leak,” another pro-MAGA voice chipped in. “Now MSM, Dems Libs & RINO’s [sic] will be going bonkers calming [sic] he will get us in another war. Kudos CIC, Pete Hegseth & U.S. military & thanks.”
Trump launched bomb attacks Saturday on three nuclear facilities in Iran, dragging the U.S. deep into its fifth active military engagement in the Middle East despite campaign promises last year to end the nation’s “forever wars” abroad.
The president claimed Iran was only “a couple of weeks” away from nuclear strike capabilities, defying intel from his own officials suggesting the country was not developing nuclear weapons and that even if it were, building a bomb would take at least three years.
Hegseth doesn’t appear to have played a critical role in Trump’s decision to join Israeli military strikes against Iran, which began last week. The Washington Post reported Friday that the president had instead “turned to a small group of lower-key but more experienced aides,” citing White House sources.
It follows after the Defense Secretary was implicated in an embarrassing series of breaches, notably the “Signalgate” scandal that saw The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg added to a group chat where Hegseth discussed airstrikes in Yemen with Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, among other members of Trump’s cabinet.
Some X users on Sunday offered a more tongue-in-cheek assessment of his role in the weekend’s strikes. “We bombed Iran and Pete Hegseth didn’t leak it in a group chat first?” one person wrote.
“BREAKING! Hegseth’s Phone Confiscated Before Iran Strike–Nation Celebrates First Mission Without a Signal Leak,” another account said. “Turns out all we needed was Airplane Mode and duct tape.”
Others assumed a dimmer view of what his track record suggests of concern for informational security at the White House. “Celebrating the occasions when there are NO leaks during an attack says a lot about the competency of this administration,” as one user put it.
The Daily Beast has reached out to Hegseth’s representatives for response.
