Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA) joined "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss what troops think about Secretary Pete Hegseth.
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00:00What do troops abroad think about him? I think we're all curious about that because
00:04they're abroad, they're serving this country, and they're seeing the Secretary of Defense,
00:10their top boss there, sharing these sensitive details on separate group chats,
00:15one group chat that includes his family members. What are they thinking? Do they feel safe right
00:19now in their jobs? No, a lot of them do not. I've heard from active duty troops I've never heard
00:25before on an issue like this that's in the political discussion. They are disgusted. They
00:31know they can't trust him. They know they can't enforce these own rules, or at least they're going
00:35to have difficulty doing so with their own troops because the top person in the Pentagon, the person
00:41who's supposed to lead by example, the person who's demanding accountability from his organization
00:46but refuses to take accountability for his own illegal behavior, just cannot be trusted. I can't
00:53tell you just how frightening it is to be in a situation where you're putting your life on the
00:59line and you can't trust the people above you. I remember what that feels like on the ground in
01:06Iraq when people in Washington were making decisions completely out of touch with reality, with the
01:12reality that we faced on the ground in that war. It's an incredibly disheartening feeling. And even at
01:18that time though, we didn't have a secretary of defense who was this incompetent. We didn't have
01:24a secretary of defense, even though I disagreed with many of the things they were doing, who just
01:28lied through his teeth and was completely untrusted by even his closest advisors. I don't think we've
01:35ever had a situation like this before in American history, and it's incredibly dangerous for our
01:40national security. We all know we can't trust Hegseth. That means our allies don't respect him and can't
01:47trust him. That means our adversaries, our enemies around the globe, don't respect him and don't trust
01:53his resolve. And worst of all, it means our own troops cannot trust him with their lives.
02:01I'm curious what you think our enemies specifically are thinking right now, because this is what White House
02:07Press Secretary Caroline Levitt said today. This is what happens when the entire Pentagon is working
02:12against you and working against the monumental change you are trying to implement. And that quote
02:17sounds like some in the Trump administration are at war with the government they run. And this approach
02:22arguably helped them win when they were campaigning. But now they're running the government here. So what
02:27type of message is this sending to the enemies abroad, as well as our enlisted men and women abroad too?
02:32It shows that the top people in the Trump administration know absolutely nothing about
02:39leadership. And what the message that it's sending to our adversaries abroad is that this is a good time
02:45to think about taking advantage of the United States. There's chaos at the top of the Pentagon,
02:49as admitted by some of Hegseth's own closest advisors. Our troops know that they can't trust their
02:57leadership. This is a recipe for American military disaster. And it's an invitation to our adversaries
03:04to take advantage of us now.