Two senior Republican senators sternly criticized Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday as Russia handled Russia’s handling of the deal in amid efforts to end the Ukrainian war, revealing the party’s deepening open divisions on foreign policy.
Senator Mitch McConnell, one of three Republicans who opposed Hegseth’s confirmation in January, began a Senate budget hearing on President Trump’s attitude toward Ukraine.
“In my opinion, the reputation of the United States is very clear,” said McConnell, a former Senate Majority Leader who leads the Appropriations Committee’s Defense Subcommittee. “Will we defend democratic allies from authoritarian aggressors?”
The outspoken Mr. Hawke McConnell on Russia and the military issues was critical of the Trump administration’s defense spending plan and refuted Mr. Hegses’ argument that the administration made the biggest investment in the military in 20 years through Trump’s settlement plan.
Mr. McConnell, a Republican of Kentucky, said putting military spending into the program rather than increasing spending in the regular budget “will probably end up operating as a Shell game to avoid making the most important annual investment we have spent years urging us to urge the Biden administration to do it.”
The exchange between Mr. McConnell and Mr. Heggs gave a glimpse of the gap in foreign policy, such as Mr. McConnell, the reduced cohort of internationalists like Mr. McConnell, and the brave wing led by Mr. Heggs and figures such as Vice President Jd Vance, who expressed the “America First” view that “America First” involves the Universal.
“We don’t want to be the title of Russia’s victory and the United States’ loss at the end of this conflict,” McConnell told the Pentagon head.
South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham also challenged Mr. Heggss and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Dan Caine even if Russian President Vladimir V. Putin will succeed on the battlefield.
“I don’t believe he is,” General Kane said.
“It remains to be seen,” Mr. Heggs said.
Mr. Graham cut off his secretary and mentioned Nazi Germany’s territory expansion before World War II: “Well, he said he wasn’t. It was the 30s.
The interaction is more confrontational than the friendly reception the secretary received from House Republicans at a similar budget hearing Tuesday.
But, like at the House hearing, Senate Democrats attacked Mr. Heggs on Wednesday, demanding a decision by the administration to call nearly 5,000 Marines and National Guard members to Los Angeles to help Queld radiate sporadic unrest there.
Mr. Hegses told the Senators that the same legal authorities that the Pentagon used to send Marines and Guards to Los Angeles could be used in other cities “if there is riots where law enforcement officers are threatened.”
He added: “We will have the ability to proliferate the National Guard there if necessary.”
In other exchanges, Mr. Heggs offered a harsher tone with the Democrats compared to Mr. McConnell and Mr. Graham.
When Chris Murphy, a Democrat in Connecticut, asked whether the National Guard deployed to Washington to respond appropriately to the attack on the Capitol by Trump supporters, he refused to answer directly twice.
Instead, the secretary said it was appropriate to deploy the National Guard troops to Los Angeles. Mr. Murphy put Mr. Heggs unwilling to agree to the National Guard deployment to protect the Capitol, and he was willing to deploy troops to Los Angeles who criticized Mr. Trump.
Mr. Heggs does admit that the National Guard mission in Los Angeles has nothing to do with the “fatality” of one of his Pentagon’s priorities. The military mission there, he said, is about “law and order.” In response, Rhode Island Democratic Senator Jack Reed said: “Law and order are the civic function of the United States, not the military function.” He added that the National Guard’s presence in the city is likely to be illegal and “a reduction in the military.”
Senator Richard J. Durbin, a Democratic Party in Illinois, criticized the Pentagon for cutting military medical research and spent $45 million to attend the parade to celebrate the Army’s 250th birthday, which is also part of Mr. Trump’s birthday.
“It’s inconsistent with what men and women in uniform deserve,” Doubin said.
John Ismay and Robert Jimison Contribution report.
