<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Critics of the War Department&#8217;s purchase of steak and lobster have largely fallen silent in the face of overwhelming evidence that this is standard practice for troops about to deploy. But while they were going, they were loud — and they were all Democrats.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) blasted War Secretary Pete Hegseth on social media and accused him of wasting taxpayer money on luxuries such as “fruit baskets, Herman Miller recliners, ice cream machines, Alaskan king crabs, and a Steinway &amp; Sons grand piano.”</span></p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">Hegseth spent $93 billion in one month – roughly the cost of extending the ACA tax credits for THREE YEARS.</p>
<p>But instead of lowering American’s healthcare costs, Hegseth used millions of taxpayer dollars on fruit baskets, Herman Miller recliners, ice cream machines, Alaskan… <a href="https://t.co/bdCHRWip3P">https://t.co/bdCHRWip3P</a></p>
<p>— Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) <a href="https://twitter.com/SenSchumer/status/2031497646892872011?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 10, 2026</a></p></blockquote>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">California Governor Gavin Newsom similarly circulated a <a href="https://x.com/GovPressOffice/status/2031441496801529864">viral post</a> accusing the Pentagon of blowing through $93 billion in spending during a single month.</span></p>
<p>By now, countless commentators have pointed out that there&#8217;s nothing unusual about serving steak and lobster to troops on the verge of deploying. <span style="font-weight: 400;">Military leaders have </span><a href="https://www.army.mil/article/284118/food_connects_us_nutrition_community_important_for_service_members"><span style="font-weight: 400;">frequently emphasized</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> that small comforts can have an outsized impact on morale, particularly for troops stationed overseas or serving in stressful environments. And, according to a recent analysis from government watchdog group <a href="https://openthebooks.substack.com/p/pentagon-should-focus-on-defense">Open the Books,</a></span> the War Department purchased much of its steak and lobster towards the end of the last fiscal year, when <span style="font-weight: 400;"> federal agencies often accelerate purchases before budgets reset.</span></p>
<p>Faced with all this evidence, critics have been eating crow. But perhaps they should also eat fungus.</p>
<p>In 2024, the Biden Defense Department <span style="font-weight: 400;">awarded nearly $1.5 million to The Better Meat Company, a California firm that develops alternative protein products using fungal roots grown in bioreactors. The company’s process feeds water and nutrients to the fungus in a fermentation tank, producing a gray semi-solid material that can be processed into protein ingredients.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Pentagon officials at the time insisted the project was not intended to place synthetic meat substitutes in soldiers’ Meals Ready-to-Eat (MREs). Instead, a Pentagon spokesman said the funding supported a facility for producing shelf-stable protein ingredients that could help sustain troops deployed around the world.</span></p>
<p>“Where was the outrage when the Biden administration wanted to force-feed franken-meat to America’s military heroes?&#8221; Jack Hubbard, executive director of the watchdog Center for the Environment and Welfare, said. &#8220;&#8216;Ick&#8217; factor aside, there are no long-term health studies on the effects of lab-grown meat. Our armed forces deserve better.”</p>
<p data-start="433" data-end="620">Hegseth has made combating the Biden administration&#8217;s woke policies central to his mission at the helm of the War Department, saying that doing so boosts morale and makes the country safer.</p>
<p data-start="622" data-end="934">“We became the woke department. But not anymore,” Hegseth said during a 2025 <a href="https://www.war.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/4318689/secretary-of-war-pete-hegseth-addresses-general-and-flag-officers-at-quantico-v/">address</a> to generals and flag officers. “This administration has done a great deal from day one to remove the social justice, politically correct, and toxic ideological garbage that had infected our department, to rip out the politics.”</p>
<p data-start="936" data-end="1048">Hegseth added that the effort included eliminating programs he said distracted from the military’s core mission.</p>
<p data-start="1050" data-end="1367">“No more identity months, DEI offices, dudes in dresses. No more climate change worship. No more division, distraction, or gender delusions,” he said. “As I&#8217;ve said before and will say again, we are done with that sh*t. I&#8217;ve made it my mission to uproot the obvious distractions that made us less capable and less lethal.”</p>

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