Pete Hegseth, nominated to lead the Department of Defense and return it to its mission, has been accused by a woman of awful things that supposedly happened during a date with him.
The accusations involve alcohol, partying, and sexual assault in 2017, and the woman who says she is the victim filed a police report about it at the time.
Hegseth has described her as what many would see a stalker obsessed with him at the time. The former Fox News host denies the assault allegations and told California police in 2017 that “there was ‘always’ conversation and ‘always’ consensual contact,” between him and the woman. The Monterey County district attorney and the Monterey police Department investigated but could find nothing solid to support the claims. They refused to prosecute.
“As far as the media is concerned, it’s very simple: The matter was fully investigated and I was completely cleared, and that’s where I’m gonna leave it,” Hegseth said last week on Capitol Hill, as he was making the rounds to meet with Republican senators, who will be the ones to confirm or deny his appointment.
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski will be in the spotlight once again on this and other confirmation votes. She hates Donald Trump and could become his worst Senate nightmare, for confirmations and legislation.
Murkowski famously went against the nomination of now-U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was confirmed without her vote, which was “present.” Kavanaugh had also been accused by a woman for a sexual assault that supposedly took place during a college party. He also denied the accusation, but Murkowski, who flunked the Alaska Bar Exam three times, was in the “believe all women” category and decided he wasn’t qualified.
Murkowski even asked for an addition FBI background check on Kavanaugh, saying “I was one who joined in asking that the FBI step in and do further review.” In the end, she just sat there and didn’t vote.
Over the eruptions of ululating women protesters in the Senate gallery and halls, the vote to confirm Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court proceeded 50-48, with just one senator withholding her vote: Murkowski.
A “present” vote is technically a “no” vote.
Once, Murkowski was a defender of the wrongly accused. Harken back to Sen. Ted Stevens, subject of a Department of Justice witch hunt back in 2008. Murkowski believed Stevens. But that was then. And this is now — one of Donald Tump’s appointees. She was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump for an imagined role in the Jan. 6, 2021, surge of protesters at the U.S. Capitol.
Of the six most likely holdouts on Hegseth, including Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, Sen. Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and Sen.-elect John Curtis of Utah, Murkowski appears to be the most dug in on all the appointments, saying she will need to see their FBI reports. And then maybe additional ones, as she did with Justice Kavanaugh.
