(WASHINGTON) — A top aide to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is berating independent auditors at the Pentagon for their ongoing review into the secretary’s use of the Signal messaging app, calling the assessment “a political witch hunt” and a “sham.”
The statement by Sean Parnell, Hegseth’s chief spokesman, suggests the defense secretary is preparing to challenge the upcoming findings by the Defense Department Office of the Inspector General, which is expected to be released in coming weeks.
Parnell’s use of the term “sham” to describe the IG’s work also raises questions about the fate of the independent watchdog office under President Donald Trump.
During his first week in office, Trump fired the Pentagon’s inspector general at the time, Robert Storch, along with more than a dozen other agency IGs. With Storch fired by Trump, the review is being led by acting Inspector General Steve Stebbins, who spent much of his career in the Army before becoming a career civil servant.
Mollie Halpern, a spokesperson for the IG office, declined to comment.
“Consistent with the long-standing policy of the DoD OIG, we do not comment on ongoing oversight project,” Halpern wrote in an emailed statement.
In his statement provided to reporters late Tuesday, Parnell said the IG evaluation “is clearly a political witch hunt” by “Biden administration holdovers.”
“The Secretary has provided a statement to the IG — which points out why this entire exercise is a sham, conducted in bad faith and with extreme bias,” he added.
Parnell initially released his statement to the The New York Times, which first reported Tuesday that Hegseth now requires general officers nominated for a fourth star to meet with Trump in advance of their nominations being finalized. A U.S. official confirmed to ABC News that the new process is in place.
Anna Kelly, a White House spokesperson, said Trump “wants to ensure our military is the greatest and most lethal fighting force in history, which is why he meets with four-star-general nominees directly to ensure they are war fighters first — not bureaucrats.”
Under consideration by the IG is whether Hegseth violated Pentagon policies last March when the secretary used the commercial messaging app Signal to relay details about a military strike in Yemen.
According to texts released by The Atlantic, which the White House confirmed as authentic, Hegseth detailed in an unclassified chat group with other officials how a strike would unfold and when, including the use of F-18 fighter jets and Tomahawk missiles.
“THIS IS WHEN THE FIRST BOMBS WILL DEFINITELY DROP,” Hegseth wrote at one point referencing Yemen and noting the military time of 1415 (2:15 p.m.) ahead of the March 15 strike.
Hegseth also shared details about the imminent attack in a second group chat that included his wife, his brother and his personal lawyer, two sources familiar with the contents of the chat told ABC News. Sources say the details on the strike originated from a classified document and that among the questions being asked by the IG is whether Hegseth personally wrote the texts or if another staffer typed out the details.
Hegseth has insisted repeatedly that the information was never classified in the first place. CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence, also testified that the chat did not include classified information.
Stebbins, as acting IG, agreed to conduct an “evaluation” of the Pentagon’s Signal use at the request from Congress, which included Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the Republican chairman of the Armed Services Committee. Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the panel, also requested the review.
“The information as published recently appears to me to be of such a sensitive nature that, based on my knowledge, I would have wanted it classified,” Wicker said following the report by The Atlantic.
In a statement to reporters, Reed said it was wrong for Parnell to criticize the IG office.
“The civilian leadership of the Department of Defense is not above the law,” Reed said. “To suggest that the nonpartisan Inspector General is doing anything other than their impartial duties is simply wrong. Taxpayers and military personnel deserve to know the truth, and the Inspector General’s office has a responsibility to follow all evidence and report its independent findings.”
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