CNN's Scott Jennings: "Pete Hegseth Kicked Their Asses Today," It Was Embarrassing For The Democratic Party
CNN's political commentators Scott Jennings and Karen Finney join CNN's Dana Bash to give their takeaways of Pete Hegseth's Senate confirmation hearing.
DANA BASH: Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump's pick to run the Department of Defense, took a lot of tough questions on Capitol Hill earlier today. Despite that, CNN has learned that President-elect Donald Trump's team is in good spirits. They see the warm reception that he received from Republican senators as a very good sign.
I want to discuss this with CNN senior political commentator Scott Jennings and CNN political commentator Karen Finney. Hello to both of you. Scott, what's your takeaway?
SCOTT JENNINGS: Well, in short, I think Pete Hegseth kicked their asses today. I mean, it wasn't even close. They didn't lay a glove on Hegseth.
No mistakes. Calm, cool, collected. I mean, before the thing even started, you had this like Code Pink, you know, protester freak show trying to disrupt the hearing.
That's the Democratic base, by the way, which probably explains why the Democrats on the committee acted in such a bizarre and unprofessional way. I was appalled at some of the way these senators handled themselves and some of the lines of questioning. I mean, Tim Kaine sounded like a sex pervert in his questioning of Pete Hegseth.
Blumenthal, who lied about his service in Vietnam, questioning Hegseth's qualifications. You had Gillibrand. You had Warren.
You had Hirono going on unhinged rants about things. Angus King obviously doesn't understand what it's like to fight terrorism. On and on and on, Hegseth was cool in the face of this unhinged questioning.
They made him look good today. It would be difficult for a Republican to vote against Hegseth after the Democrats' unseemly mudslinging today.
BASH: Karen?
KAREN FINNEY: Well, look, it was as performative as these hearings ever get. I mean, Republicans do it to Democrats.
Democrats do it to Republicans. I mean, so that happens on all sides. Look, overall, though, clearly Hegseth was well prepared, and it was clear Democrats recognized that given that there was some clearly concern that he wouldn't be able to handle more than one round of questioning, they were clearly trying to get certain things on the record.
Personally, I would have--the comms person in me would have framed it differently. I would have talked about a number of these issues, both based on his writings, which at one point they were trying to do that. That was part of the strategy.
But really, in the context of the modern military, because the reality is, as military leaders will tell you, climate change is a national security concern. It's real. It is a threat to our forces.
It is a threat to our bases. It is a threat to our readiness. So I would have framed some of these questions more in the context of the current challenges the modern military faces.
It is a diverse force, which is part of why diversity matters. I thought they also could have done more to, again, use some of the concerns about the way Trump has spoken. I thought Slotkin was very effective with this in terms of the use of force on American soil and the Geneva Conventions.
I think those questions got a little muddled, and I think those topics actually are very relevant and did not get quite the airing I wish they would have.
BASH: That's interesting. It doesn't sound like you're all that thrilled with the way that your party's senators sort of performed as a whole, despite very notable exceptions. You didn't love it.
FINNEY: I didn't love it.
BASH: Well, there's one senator who you know pretty well, considering the fact that he was the vice presidential nominee when he worked on the Hillary Clinton-Tim Kaine presidential campaign. Because Scott mentioned this, I do want to run part of what Tim Kaine said in his line of questioning, and then on the backside, I want to listen to Mark Wayne Mullen, Republican senator who's very close with Pete Hexeth, said as a counter.
SEN. TIM KAINE: Many of your work colleagues have said that you show up for work under the influence of alcohol or drunk. I know you've denied that, but you would agree with me, right, that if that was the case, that would be disqualifying for somebody to be secretary of defense.
PETE HEGSETH: Senator, those are all anonymous false claims, and the totality--
KAINE: They're not anonymous... We have seen records with names attached to all of these, including the name of your own mother. So don't make this into some anonymous press thing.
SEN. MULLIN: The senator from Virginia starts bringing up the fact that what if you showed up drunk to your job? How many senators have showed up drunk to vote at night? Have any of you guys asked them to step down and resign from their job?
And don't tell me you haven't seen it, because I know you have. And then how many senators do you know have got a divorce before cheating on their wives? Did you ask them to step down? No, but it's for show. You guys, make sure you make a big show and point out the hypocrisy, because a man's made a mistake.
BASH: Karen.
FINNEY: So here's what I thought was interesting about that, and Mark Kelly tried to get to that. First of all, Tim Kaine, he came loaded with the questions he wanted to ask.
He has a son who served in the military, so obviously he takes a lot of this very seriously in terms of the expectations. The expectations we have of our members should be the same expectations and standards we hold the secretary to. I don't think he was wrong on that.
But I thought Mark Kelly did a little bit of a better job kind of teasing some of that out and trying to get more underneath some of the substance of that question in terms of, he said, well, you've said you have made mistakes, but you're not willing to tell us what the mistakes are. That was another way to kind of go at that question.
BASH: And Scott, before I let you guys go, did you have any concern about the sort of lack of answers on some of the really important policy issues that he will have to face as defense secretary or even information about treaties like ASEAN?
JENNINGS: No, I don't have any concerns about anything he did today. I thought he specifically answered the questions he needed to. And some of this stuff is going to be set by the president of the United States and the president's National Security Council advisors and staff.
I mean, he's not a one-man show. Secretary of Defense is important, but there's a whole national security team. I don't think Hegseth or anyone else from one of these kinds of positions should go to the table and act like they're going to unilaterally set policy.
So I think he handled himself well today. I think Democrats had maybe built up in their mind that he was going to be a low performer. They lowered the bar, but he far jumped over any expectations they had set.
And I just want to say one thing about Karen's comments. She made some great points. She raised some issues that Democrats obviously care about.
These are important issues. I agree with her that maybe they did deserve a little more questioning today, which is why it's all the more puzzling why a Tim Kaine, who's worked for the Clintons or campaigned with him, who campaigned with Doug Emhoff, decided to spend eight minutes.
So he's he's supported some of these folks. And then he decided to spend eight minutes on the granular details of this man's sex life.
I mean, it was embarrassing for the Democratic Party today, particularly coming from Kaine. So I think Karen has it right. They did not do a good job.
They totally whiffed on this and they made it more, less likely that Hegseth is going to be confirmed.
