Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
Editorials & Other Articles
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Hegseth lashed out at DOGE official in tense Pentagon confrontation
Hegseth lashed out at DOGE official in tense Pentagon confrontation
The episode was sparked by claims that a team leader with Elon Musk’s cost-cutting organization had called law enforcement on a colleague, people familiar with the matter said.
July 15, 2025 at 7:11 p.m. EDT Yesterday
with President Donald Trump at the White House. (Tom Brenner/For The Washington Post)
By Dan Lamothe
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth lashed out at the Pentagon’s top representative from Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service weeks ago in an angry confrontation arising from claims the DOGE official had summoned law enforcement to remove a subordinate from the building, according to three people familiar with the matter.
The tense encounter in early April occurred with Yinon Weiss, a tech entrepreneur and military veteran like the secretary who had just become Musk’s team lead at the Defense Department. Raising his voice at times, Hegseth demanded that Weiss explain why he thought he possessed such authority, these people said, all speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid reprisal by the Trump administration.
The altercation, which has not been reported previously, was set in motion after a DOGE lieutenant at the time, Justin Fulcher, stormed out of a one-on-one meeting with Weiss and went to Hegseth’s office to complain that he thought Weiss had reported him to the Pentagon Force Protection Agency, an internal police and security force. It’s unclear what triggered the dispute between Fulcher and Weiss, or whether law enforcement was ever called. However, the possibility that a DOGE official had acted unilaterally to evict someone from government property upset Hegseth, who considered it an unacceptable overreach, people familiar with the matter said.
It is unusual for a Cabinet secretary to engage so directly with seemingly minor disciplinary matters involving lower-level staff. The episode coincided with a tumultuous period for Hegseth after the disclosure in March that he used an unclassified group chat with other top administration officials to relay highly sensitive military planning for an attack on Houthi militants in Yemen. It also spotlights the friction that has sometimes existed between senior Pentagon officials and those assigned to DOGE, whose mandate to dramatically gut the federal workforce and slash government spending has been complicated by national security concerns.
{snip}
By Dan Lamothe
Dan Lamothe joined The Washington Post in 2014 to cover the U.S. military. He has written about the Armed Forces since 2008, traveling extensively, embedding with five branches of service and covering combat in Afghanistan.follow on X@danlamothe
The episode was sparked by claims that a team leader with Elon Musk’s cost-cutting organization had called law enforcement on a colleague, people familiar with the matter said.
July 15, 2025 at 7:11 p.m. EDT Yesterday
with President Donald Trump at the White House. (Tom Brenner/For The Washington Post)
By Dan Lamothe
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth lashed out at the Pentagon’s top representative from Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service weeks ago in an angry confrontation arising from claims the DOGE official had summoned law enforcement to remove a subordinate from the building, according to three people familiar with the matter.
The tense encounter in early April occurred with Yinon Weiss, a tech entrepreneur and military veteran like the secretary who had just become Musk’s team lead at the Defense Department. Raising his voice at times, Hegseth demanded that Weiss explain why he thought he possessed such authority, these people said, all speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid reprisal by the Trump administration.
The altercation, which has not been reported previously, was set in motion after a DOGE lieutenant at the time, Justin Fulcher, stormed out of a one-on-one meeting with Weiss and went to Hegseth’s office to complain that he thought Weiss had reported him to the Pentagon Force Protection Agency, an internal police and security force. It’s unclear what triggered the dispute between Fulcher and Weiss, or whether law enforcement was ever called. However, the possibility that a DOGE official had acted unilaterally to evict someone from government property upset Hegseth, who considered it an unacceptable overreach, people familiar with the matter said.
It is unusual for a Cabinet secretary to engage so directly with seemingly minor disciplinary matters involving lower-level staff. The episode coincided with a tumultuous period for Hegseth after the disclosure in March that he used an unclassified group chat with other top administration officials to relay highly sensitive military planning for an attack on Houthi militants in Yemen. It also spotlights the friction that has sometimes existed between senior Pentagon officials and those assigned to DOGE, whose mandate to dramatically gut the federal workforce and slash government spending has been complicated by national security concerns.
{snip}
By Dan Lamothe
Dan Lamothe joined The Washington Post in 2014 to cover the U.S. military. He has written about the Armed Forces since 2008, traveling extensively, embedding with five branches of service and covering combat in Afghanistan.follow on X@danlamothe
1 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
