Trump Dou­bles Down On Hegseth Sup­port As Media Cam­paign Against Him Appears To Lose Momen­tum

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Trump Doubles Down On Hegseth Support As Media Campaign Against Him Appears To Lose Momentum

Pres­i­dent-elect Don­ald Trump dou­bled down on his sup­port of defense sec­re­tary nom­i­nee Pete Hegseth on Fri­day as the media cam­paign against the for­mer Fox News host appears to be los­ing momen­tum.

Hegseth, who vowed Thurs­day to keep vying for his prospec­tive role “as long as Don­ald Trump wants” him “in the fight,” faces a siege of accu­sa­tions involv­ing alco­hol con­sump­tion and sex­u­al mis­con­duct. Trump gave no acknowl­edg­ment to the alle­ga­tions, call­ing his cab­i­net pick a “WINNER” in a sup­port­ive Truth Social post.

“Pete Hegseth is doing very well. His sup­port is strong and deep, much more so than the Fake News would have you believe. He was a great stu­dent – Princeton/Harvard edu­cat­ed – with a Mil­i­tary state of mind. He will be a fan­tas­tic, high ener­gy, Sec­re­tary of Defense Defense (sic), one who leads with charis­ma and skill. Pete is a WINNER, and there is noth­ing that can be done to change that!!!” Trump wrote.

The pres­i­dent-elect was hon­ored Thurs­day night by Fox News as “Patri­ot of the Year” in the network’s annu­al Patri­ot Awards, an event host­ed by Hegseth var­i­ous years in the past.

Hegseth was the sub­ject of a 2017 inves­ti­ga­tion into claims he sex­u­al­ly assault­ed a woman in Cal­i­for­nia. How­ev­er, no charges were ever filed relat­ing to the inci­dent, which was report­ed on in late Novem­ber. Hegseth vehe­ment­ly denied the accu­sa­tions.

Pene­lope Hegseth, the nominee’s moth­er, took to Fox News on Wednes­day to address a New York Times report of an email con­demn­ing her son’s alleged mis­treat­ment of women “for his own pow­er and ego.” She blast­ed the pub­li­ca­tion for threat­en­ing her in their request for com­ment. (RELATED: Eliz­a­beth War­ren Faces Con­ser­v­a­tive Blow­back For Crit­i­ciz­ing Trump’s Defense Sec­re­tary Nom­i­nee)

On Tues­day, an NBC News report cit­ing 10 anony­mous for­mer Fox News col­leagues alleged Hegseth smelled of alco­hol before going live on air. “Fox and Friends Week­end” co-host Will Cain respond­ed by com­pil­ing a thread of dozens of Fox News employ­ees pub­licly defend­ing Hegseth.

Hegseth told SiriusXM’s Meg­yn Kel­ly on Wednes­day that he believes he is the tar­get of a “smear” cam­paign com­pa­ra­ble to U.S. Supreme Court Jus­tice Brett Kavanaugh’s con­fir­ma­tion process.

Vice Pres­i­dent-elect J.D. Vance repost­ed Trump’s state­ment of sup­port Fri­day, reit­er­at­ing that team Trump has Hegseth’s back.

“Led by Pres­i­dent Trump, we’re fight­ing for Pete Hegseth. And we’re doing so because Pete Hegseth will fight for our troops,” Vance wrote. “For too long, the Pen­ta­gon has been led by peo­ple who lose wars. Pete Hegseth is a man who fought in those wars.”