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Opinion | I vetted Pete Hegseth for Team Trump in 2016. He wasn't qualified then — and still isn't.

MSNBC
Summary
Nutrition label

71% Informative

Pete Hegseth is a Fox News weekend on-air talent, but he's not a good enough qualified to run the Department of Defense , says Julian Zelizer .

Zelizer: He was likely chosen because he seems willing to say and do anything Trump wants, has expressed favorable views on war crimes, and because Trump thinks he looks and sounds good on TV.

He says vetting a candidate for an administration requires scouring the public domain for available information.

The potential new secretary of defense has no experience running a large organization, lacks foreign policy experience, and has never worked in a meaningful way with Congress to pass billions in military budgets.

What Hegseth lacks in experience he makes up in dangerous partisan rhetoric, having worked at such venerated journalistic institutions as Glenn Beck ’s “ The Blaze ,” and more recently, Fox News .

VR Score

70

Informative language

65

Neutral language

40

Article tone

informal

Language

English

Language complexity

61

Offensive language

possibly offensive

Hate speech

not hateful

Attention-grabbing headline

not detected

Known propaganda techniques

detected

Time-value

short-lived

External references

19

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/giuliani-s-work-iranian-group-bloody-past-could-lead-more-n1067766https://www.linkedin.com/company/concerned-veterans-for-america/https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/authorities-drop-battery-charges-against-trump-campaign-manager-corey-lewandowski-n556051https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/pete-hegseth-sex-assault-allegation-rcna180319https://graphics.axios.com/docs/white-house-vetting-docs/Rudy%20Giuliani%20Backgrounder.pdf#_ga=2.25341693.1321839801.1723747738-2067767999.1720459921https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/corey-lewandowski-fired-trump-pac-after-sexual-harassment-allegations-n1280420https://www.cnn.com/2018/09/30/investing/bear-stearns-2008-crisis-jimmy-cayne/index.htmlhttps://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-issues-pardons-service-members-accused-war-crimes/story?id=67055490https://manhattan.institute/person/christopher-f-rufohttps://www.axios.com/2019/06/23/leaked-donald-trump-vetting-docs-hbohttps://www.businessinsider.com/fox-host-pete-hegseth-tells-trump-to-bomb-iranian-homeland-2020-1https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/22/rudy-giuliani-opioid-epidemic-oxycontin-purdue-pharmahttps://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/manafort-convicted-8-counts-n901231https://graphics.axios.com/docs/white-house-vetting-docs/Peter%20Hegseth%20Backgrounder.pdf#_ga=2.199351853.2073293988.1731458214-1182660073.1731458214https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/26/world/americas/marco-rubio-venezuela.htmlhttps://www.foxnews.com/media/pete-hegseth-vows-send-back-harvard-university-degree-writes-return-sender-diplomahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZX-tRTD1lqUhttps://floridapolitics.com/archives/419663-michael-waltz-we-are-in-a-cold-war-with-the-chinese-communist-party/https://x.com/NoahCRothman/status/1856493774177796453

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