Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona isn’t done wiping the floor with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. During a Center for American Progress event in Washington Thursday, Kelly was asked how he felt about Hegseth questioning his integrity—and he didn’t hold back.
Kelly: I don’t take the guy very seriously. I mean, he talks about me on Twitter. I’m a captain in ‘06 in the U.S. Navy, retired. He puts the “captain” in quotes like he thinks these four little dots are going to scare me. He’s not a serious person.
He did put members of the military at significant risk putting operational information on a Signal chain that could be—if his phone was being monitored by, let’s say, the Russians. The Russians send that information to the Iranians, the Iranians said it to the Houthis. It was when these airplanes were in the air … They could have shot them down.
He wanted to show off to his buddies on the National Security Council. “Oh, look what I just heard. I just got this cool information, I’m going to share it with you.” There are also devices that you can share classified information that he should have had access to. He was told by the inspector general that he put those folks at risk. He also said the information wasn’t classified because, after the fact, he declassified it in his head.
Related | Hegseth could have killed troops with Signal chat leak
