Sen. Mark Kelly’s fellow Arizonan tore into War Secretary Pete Hegseth Monday after the Pentagon announced it was probing “serious allegations of misconduct” after Kelly and five other Democrats released a video calling on service members to “refuse illegal orders.”
“You will never, ever, ever even be half the man that Sen. Kelly is,” Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), a former Marine, addressed Hegseth during an appearance on CNN’s “The Arena with Kasie Hunt.”
“You, sir, are a coward! And the fact that you are following this order from the president shows how big of a coward you are. And I can’t wait till you no longer are the Secretary of Defense.”
President Trump had called Nov. 20 for the arrest of Kelly and the five other lawmakers — Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, Reps. Chris Deluzio and Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania, Rep. Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire, and Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado — over the video, which he said displayed “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL”.
In announcing the investigation of Kelly, Hegseth referred to the lawmakers as the “Seditious Six” and said the video had been “despicable, reckless and false … Kelly’s conduct brings discredit upon the armed forces and will be addressed appropriately.”
Hegseth added that as a retired naval officer, Kelly was the only member of the cohort subject to War Department discipline.
In response to the announcement, Hegseth posted a social media video in which he cursed out the war secretary.
“There’s no reason why they’re going after him,” Gallego said in the clip. “He was doing his duty and just reminding people about their rights as service members. And Secretary Hegseth, all these guys—f— you guys. You’re not gonna be able to scare us. We have a right to defend the Constitution of the United States. We have the right to tell other service members that they have a right to ignore illegal orders, and you’re not going to be able to intimidate us.”
In an appearance on MS NOW Monday night, Kelly claimed his comments were “pretty simple and non-controversial.”
“I said … that members of the military should follow the law, and in response to that, Donald Trump said I should be executed, I should be hanged, I should be prosecuted,” he told “The Rachel Maddow Show.”
“He even went on and said something about, ‘Go get them,’ I guess sending a mob to round me and the other folks up,” the senator continued. “I think it says a lot more about him than it says about me. He doesn’t want accountability. But Rachel, I’m not gonna be silenced, I’m not gonna be intimidated.”
None of the six Democrats have specified any order issued by the White House or Pentagon that they believe to be immoral. However, Slotkin and Crow have respectively introduced legislation that would limit Trump’s ability to deploy the National Guard in US cities and carry out strikes against suspected drug traffickers at sea.
