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GOP Armed Services chair slams Hegseth for ‘rookie mistake’ – likens him to Tucker Carlson

February 14, 2025 | | Print Article

The Republican Senate Armed Services chair criticized Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for a “rookie mistake” he made in remarks about peace between Ukraine and Russia.

Senator Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) reacted to Hegseth’s comments on Ukraine being welcomed into NATO when he spoke Wednesday at the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels. The senator, who has long advocated for Ukraine’s side in the conflict, compared Hegseth’s speech to something Tucker Carlson would say in remarks to Politico.

“Hegseth is going to be a great defense secretary, although he wasn’t my choice for the job,” Wicker told Politico while at the Munich Security Conference. “But he made a rookie mistake in Brussels, and he’s walked back some of what he said but not that line.”

Last week, Hegseth said he did “not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement,” noting the “illusionary goal” of returning the country to pre-war borders.

“I don’t know who wrote the speech — it is the kind of thing Tucker Carlson could have written, and Carlson is a fool,” Wicker told Politico, adding, “Everybody knows … and people in the administration know you don’t say before your first meeting what you will agree to and what you won’t agree to.”

“I prefer we didn’t give away negotiating positions before we actually get started talking about the end of the Russia-Ukraine war,” said the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee. “There are good guys and bad guys in this war, and the Russians are the bad guys.”

“They invaded, contrary to almost every international law, and they should be defeated,” the Mississippi Republican added. “And Ukraine is entitled to the promises that the world made to it.”

Hegseth addressed the blowback over his comments on Thursday as he told reporters that “everything is on the table” in the negotiations.

“I want to be clear about something as it pertains to NATO membership not being realistic outcome for negotiations. That’s something that was stated as part of my remarks here, as part of the coordination with how we’re executing these ongoing negotiations,” the Defense Secretary said.

“These negotiations are led by President Trump. Everything is on the table. In his conversations with [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky. What he decides to allow or not allow is at the purview of the leader of the free world — President Trump,” he added.

“I think realism is an important part of the conversation that hasn’t existed enough inside conversations amongst friends,” he said. “But simply pointing out realism — like the borders won’t be rolled back to what everybody would like them to be in 2014 — is not a concession to Vladimir Putin. It’s a recognition of the hard power realities on the ground after a lot of investment and sacrifice … and then a realization that a negotiated peace is going to be some sort of demarcation that neither side wants.”

Frieda Powers
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