Remember the Pentagon's witch hunt searching desperately for so-called "white supremacy" within the ranks of the U.S. military? The conspiracy—propagated by a Biden nominee—was brought up during U.S. Defense Secretary-designate Pete Hegseth's confirmation hearing Tuesday.
Hegseth had the perfect response to such unsubstantiated claims.
Senator Dan Sullivan: “Do you believe the military is a systemically racist organization?”
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) January 14, 2025
Pete Hegseth: That is fundamentally FALSE… One could argue, that if not the least, one of the least racist institutions in our country is the United States military.” pic.twitter.com/o1r5dVIvl8
Following opening remarks, Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK) turned the committee's attention to the state of the U.S. Defense Department under President Joe Biden. On Biden's watch, the U.S. military is "not focused on readiness or lethality," but rather busy fearmongering about racism, Sullivan said.
Sullivan recalled how on Day One, the Biden administration played up "a false and insulting narrative that our military is chock full of racists and violent extremists." He called this attempt to smear America's armed forces "one of the most disgraceful and shameful things I've seen over the past four years as a senator on this committee and as a Marine Corps Reserve officer."
In March 2021, Colin Kahl, Biden's pick for Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, declared that one of his top goals as the No. 3 civilian leader at the Pentagon would be to end "violent extremism and systemic racism within the ranks of the military."
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"He had no data on this. The media loved it, fanned the flames, wrote baloney stories on this false narrative. Disappointedly, some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle here reinforced this ridiculous narrative," Sullivan said. "One even suggested that almost 10 percent of our uniformed military was extremist."
Sullivan noted that this outrageous allegation, asserting that a tenth of all U.S. service members ascribe to extremist or "white supremacist" ideology, amounts to more than 200,000 military personnel.
"Mr. Hegseth, unlike Under Secretary Kahl, you have a lot of experience with our military. Do you believe our military is a systemically racist organization, and if confirmed, will you commit to defend, not denigrate, our troops?" Sulivan questioned.
"If not the least, one of the least racist institutions in our country is the United States military," Hegseth continued. "Being a racist in our military has not been tolerated for a very long time. Never in my formations. Never in other formations."
Sullivan asked if Hegseth believes the U.S. military is "one of the forward-leading" institutions in American history.
"No doubt," Hegseth replied, without hesitation.
Hegseth stated he was also offended by Kahl's comments. "Anyone who's been on active duty [...] understands it's fundamentally false," Hegseth said of the smear campaign.
Sullivan noted that there are three studies affirming what Hegseth just declared. Sullivan had successfully included an amendment to the FY 2021 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) requiring the Pentagon to produce an annual report identifying any racial inequities or signs of extremism that may exist in the military.
Kahl, however, did not present evidence or statistics to support his assertion of widespread extremism, which was later refuted by combatant commanders.
"I am very confident that the number of extremists in my forces is zero," Admiral Charles Richard, commander of U.S. Strategic Command, testified before Congress in April 2021. "The Department has made it clear for decades that we don't tolerate that."
General James Dickinson, commander of U.S. Space Command, similarly said that throughout his career, "I have not seen that. So I believe it's close to zero in my organization, if not zero."
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