Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Wednesday that he was putting an end to a program that had for nearly ten years allowed Chinese coders access to Department of Defense cloud systems.
Hegseth shared a video in which he described the &#8220;Digital Escorts&#8221; program — implemented under former President Barack Obama — under which Microsoft employed Chinese coders to &#8220;support sensitive DOD cloud systems&#8221; under the supervision of American contractors.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The use of Chinese Nationals to service Department of Defense cloud environments is over. <a href="https://t.co/jZdcHwKho2">pic.twitter.com/jZdcHwKho2</a>
— Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (@SecDef) <a href="https://twitter.com/SecDef/status/1960824471683801206?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 27, 2025</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;Last month the Department of Defense was made aware of an Obama-Biden era legacy program called Digital Escorts,&#8221; Hegseth began. &#8220;For nearly a decade, Microsoft has used Chinese coders, remotely supervised by U.S. contractors, to support sensitive DOD cloud systems. The program was designed to comply with contracting rules but it exposed the department to unacceptable risk.&#8221;
&#8220;I mean, if you&#8217;re thinking &#8216;America First,&#8217; and common sense, this doesn&#8217;t pass either of those tests,&#8221; Hegseth continued. &#8220;So I initiated an immediate review of this vulnerability and I want to report our initial findings.&#8221;
Hegseth went on to explain that his review had determined that any benefits were not worth the potential risk of allowing Chinese nationals to have that kind of access to sensitive information, especially information pertaining to Defense Department.
&#8220;The use of Chinese Nationals to service Department of Defense cloud environments? It&#8217;s over,&#8221; he declared. &#8220;We&#8217;ve issued a formal letter of concern to Microsoft documenting this breach of trust, and we&#8217;re requiring a third party audit of Microsoft&#8217;s Digital Escort program — including the code and the submissions by Chinese nationals.&#8221;
Hegseth also announced a separate investigation into the program and into all of the Chinese nationals who had been part of it: &#8220;Did they put anything in the code that we didn&#8217;t know about? We&#8217;re going to find out.&#8221;
&#8220;It blows my mind that I&#8217;m even saying these things, it&#8217;s such common sense,&#8221; Hegseth said as he once again reiterated his intent to remove all Chinese employees from access to DOD information. &#8220;We expect vendors doing business with the Department of Defense to put U.S. national security ahead of profit maximization &#8230; This never should have happened in the first place.&#8221;

DOD Secretary Hegseth And Chairman Of The Joint Chiefs Caine Brief On Iran Strike

Pete Hegseth Kills Obama-Biden Program That Gave Chinese Coders Access To DOD Cloud Systems

Barack Obama

Communist China

Department of Defense

Joe Biden

Military

Pete Hegseth

Politics

President Donald Trump on Monday floated renaming the Department of Defense the Department of War.
Trump suggested reverting the Department of Defense back to its old name during a meeting at the White House with South Korean President Lee Jae-myung.
“[Defense Secretary] Pete Hegseth has been incredible with the, as I call it, the Department of War. You know, we call it the Department of Defense, but between us, I think we&#8217;re going to change the name,” the president <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/defense/5469171-trump-rename-department-war/">said</a>. “You want to know the truth, I think we&#8217;re going to have some information on that maybe soon.”
The United States previously had a War Department; it was established by President George Washington in 1789 and lasted until a reorganization of the department in 1947 by President Harry Truman. “Defense” was added to the moniker two years later.
The president elaborated further on the difference between the Department of Defense and the Department of War in the Oval Office.
<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus/?utm_campaign=summer&amp;utm_content=editorialsummersale&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_source=editorial" target="_blank" rel="noopener">End of Summer Sale – Get 40% off New DailyWire+ Annual Memberships</a>
“It used to be called the Department of War, and it had a stronger sound and, as you know, we won World War I, we won World War II, we won everything. Now, we have a Department of Defense with defenders,” Trump said.
“I don&#8217;t want to be defense only. We want defense, but we want offense, too, if that&#8217;s okay,” he continued, adding, “as Department of War, we won everything. We won everything. And I think we&#8217;re gonna have to go back to that.”
A reporter told Trump that officially renaming the Department of Defence would require an act of Congress. Trump replied that he did not think it would, but regardless, he guessed that Congress would approve such a name change if Congress is needed. GOP Sen. Mike Lee of Utah said Monday that he would introduce legislation to codify the name change.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
I’m drafting a bill to restore the Department of War to its original name—the only name that captures the full range of America’s military capabilities<a href="https://t.co/n1NjoEwBFZ">pic.twitter.com/n1NjoEwBFZ</a> <a href="https://t.co/4DeDDQfp3o">https://t.co/4DeDDQfp3o</a>
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) <a href="https://twitter.com/BasedMikeLee/status/1960092612448432272?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 25, 2025</a></blockquote>
Trump has previously <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/war-of-words-trump-hints-at-changing-name-of-defense-department/ar-AA1HpbNG">hinted</a> at bringing the old name for the Defense Department back. In June, Trump joked with reporters that he would temporarily revert the Department of Defense to the Department of War after the successful U.S. bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities.
“You know it used to be called secretary of war,” said Trump. “Maybe for a couple of weeks, we’ll call it that because we feel like warriors.”
Despite the apparent push to drop “Defense” from the Defense Department, Trump and the White House have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/pax-trumpana-trumps-resume-for-winning-the-nobel-peace-prize?author=Tim+Pearce&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trump%E2%80%99s+Nobel+Peace+Prize+Resume">touted</a> his presidency as one of peace, going so far as to call Trump the “peacemaker-in-chief” for the conflicts and near-conflicts he has helped to solve since taking office in January.

Donald Trump

Trump Floats Renaming Pentagon Back To ‘Department Of War’: ‘We Won Everything’

Executive

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Tuesday that a Civil War monument removed under the Biden administration from Arlington National Cemetery will be restored to its original location. 
The monument, known as the Reconciliation Monument or the Confederate Memorial, was removed by the Pentagon in December 2023 under President Joe Biden because of its links to the Confederacy. First erected in 1914, the monument sat in a section of the cemetery where around 400 Confederate soldiers were buried. 
“I’m proud to announce that Moses Ezekiel’s beautiful and historic sculpture — often referred to as ‘The Reconciliation Monument’ — will be rightfully be returned to Arlington National Cemetery near his burial site,” Hegseth announced on X. “It never should have been taken down by woke lemmings. Unlike the Left, we don’t believe in erasing American history—we honor it.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
I’m proud to announce that Moses Ezekiel’s beautiful and historic sculpture — often referred to as “The Reconciliation Monument” — will be rightfully be returned to Arlington National Cemetery near his burial site.
It never should have been taken down by woke lemmings. Unlike…
— Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (@SecDef) <a href="https://twitter.com/SecDef/status/1952851480643359156?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 5, 2025</a></blockquote>
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The news was first reported by The Blaze. 
In 1906, Secretary of War and future president William Howard Taft <a href="https://www.arlingtoncemetery.mil/Explore/Monuments-and-Memorials/Confederate-Memorial">approved</a> plans to construct a memorial near the Confederate graves. The monument was created by prominent Jewish American sculptor Moses Ezekiel, who fought for Virginia during the Civil War. 
Featured on the monument are 14 shields referencing the 11 official Confederate states, and the border states of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri. There are also figures of southern soldiers and civilians alongside mythical gods. 
The monument references Isaiah 2:4, a passage in the Bible that talks about turning swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, a powerful message for a nation recovering from the trauma of war and the deaths of 600,000 Americans. Many presidents, including Barack Obama, have sent flowers to the monument on Memorial Day.
After the removal by the Biden administration, the monument was moved to a Defense Department storage facility in Virginia. 
“At the request of Moses Ezekiel’s family and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Moses Ezekiel&#8217;s sculpture will be returned to Arlington National Cemetery,” Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin <a href="https://www.theblaze.com/columns/opinion/exclusive-moses-ezekiels-historic-sculpture-finally-set-for-installation-in-arlington-cemetery-by-the-southern-graves-it-once-marked">told</a> the Blaze’s Beltway Brief, “where he is buried and where his legacy as a renowned American artist and decorated veteran can be honored.”
Youngkin added that the monument would be refurbished and would be back on display in Arlington by 2027.
The announcement from Hegseth came after the National Park Service <a href="https://www.nps.gov/nama/learn/news/pike.htm">said</a> Monday that it would be returning the statue of former Confederate General Albert Pike to Washington, D.C. The statue was torn down during a riot in June 2020 and never went back on display.

US-CEMETERY-CONFEDERATE-MEMORIAL

Hegseth Returning Civil War Memorial Removed By Biden To Arlington National Cemetery

American Civil War

American History

Confederacy

Glenn Youngkin

Virginia

The National Security Agency removed its top lawyer after The Daily Wire exposed her past work investigating President Donald Trump for Democrats and penning op-eds praising censorship and defending the intelligence community’s treatment of Trump associates like Carter Page.
The intelligence agency&#8217;s webpage listing April Doss as general counsel was deleted and “multiple former officials” told The <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/us/politics/nsa-lawyer-fired.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">New York Times</a> that Doss had been removed. The removal shows that, after Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said documents show a conspiracy of “manufactured intelligence” to sabotage the president, the Trump administration is taking steps to ensure that people involved in the discredited probe are not still actively working in key roles.
Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), when serving as the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence panel, hired Doss to tie Trump to Russia. Warner lashed out at her firing, further illustrating her close ties to Democrats.
“We should be outraged by the firing of April Doss, a deeply principled public servant, apparently for the role that she played in the Senate Intelligence Committee’s bipartisan investigation into Russian election interference,” Warner said, according to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/live-blog/trump-starmer-tariffs-china-trade-immigration-israel-gaza-live-updates-rcna221282#rcrd85608" target="_blank" rel="noopener">NBC</a>. “Her dismissal appears to be the result of a politically motivated smear campaign driven by a far-right conspiracy theorist, not any legitimate concern about her conduct or qualifications.”
The Daily Wire&#8217;s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dem-senators-russia-hoax-investigator-is-top-lawyer-at-trumps-national-security-agency?author=Luke+Rosiak&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Democrat+Russia+Hoax+Investigator+Is+Now+Top+Lawyer+At+Trump’s+National+Security+Agency">July 23 story</a> showed how Doss had repeatedly made mistakes by advocating for the might of the security state to clamp down on “misinformation” in cases where she turned out to be wrong. That included using criticism of vaccines as justification for crackdowns and blaming Republican “extremists” for a plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, where there is evidence that federal assets actually entrapped the suspects.
Doss falsely accused Trump — until this week her boss — of causing an “insurrection,” despite no one being charged with such a crime, and said the January 6 protest was “deadly,” a reference to the false claims that protesters had killed police there. She also defended the treatment of Michael Flynn and Carter Page.
Doss’s strong advocacy for censorship by the government and tech firms put her at odds with important policy planks of the Trump administration. Trump’s Federal Trade Commission has aggressively <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/02/technology/ftc-investigation-advertising-boycotts.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">investigated</a> ad firms for their role in censoring so-called disinformation, such as the New York Post’s true story about Hunter Biden’s laptop.
The story also explained how NSA officials concealed Doss’s 2022 hire from Congress because officials and Democrats had blocked the appointment of a Republican with a similar background into the same general counsel role in Trump’s first term, calling it inappropriately political — a move they knew would open them to charges of double standards if Doss’s hiring were known.
Just as they did during the failed Russia investigation, the media and Democrats worked together to spread misinformation after Doss was terminated.
Warner said Doss “appeared to” have been fired because of Laura Loomer, after the Times used the sub-headline “a far-right conspiracy theorist had amplified criticism of the lawyer and her previous work.” Much of the article’s framing revolved around the fact that Loomer had shared an X post summarizing The Daily Wire’s story, while omitting the story’s actual findings, other than the fact that Doss had previously worked for Democrats.
Although the Times&#8217; decision to focus on a literal retweet instead of the actual story was unusual, the rest of the media immediately adopted it verbatim, with MSNBC&#8217;s headline blaring &#8220;Right-wing influencer allegedly helps oust a National Security Agency leader (again),&#8221; and The Daily Beast saying &#8220;Witch Hunter Laura Loomer Claims Scalp of NSA’s Top Lawyer.&#8221;
The Times’ claim that Doss’s removal was due to Loomer — which the paper used to discredit the move, because it has previously painted her as a “far-right” conspiracy theorist with inappropriate influence in the Trump administration — was also based on misinformation, with the paper saying an anonymous person told it “Loomer’s criticism appeared to have a role in the firing.”
It is unlikely that the Pentagon first heard about this from Loomer. The Daily Wire first contacted the Pentagon with questions regarding Doss on July 17.

General Counsel April F. Doss / National Security Agency

Trump-Hating Russia Hoax Investigator Fired As Top NSA Lawyer

National Security Agency (NSA)

The Department of Defense awarded a contract worth up to $200 million to an artificial intelligence company whose CEO said that President Donald Trump was a “legitimate threat to the rule of law” and likened him to a “feudal warlord.” 
Anthropic, a San Francisco-based company with extensive links to Democrats, was <a href="https://www.defense.gov/News/Contracts/Contract/Article/4243673/">awarded</a> a contract earlier this month to develop national security AI capabilities for the Pentagon. This contract comes after CEO Dario Amodei <a href="https://dailycaller.com/2025/06/30/anthropics-democrats-ai-artificial-intelligence-alarmism-trump-contracts/">lambasted</a> Trump as a “clown” who appointed “idiots” to government positions. 
Beginning with a $2 million award, Anthropic will <a href="https://www.anthropic.com/news/anthropic-and-the-department-of-defense-to-advance-responsible-ai-in-defense-operations">work with</a> the Defense Department to “anticipate and mitigate potential adversarial uses of AI” and the exchange of “technical insights, performance data, and operational feedback to accelerate responsible AI adoption across the defense enterprise.” 
By the end of the project, the company, which created AI chatbot Claude, could be awarded 200 million in taxpayer dollars. 
According to the Department of Defense, the project will mainly take place in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area and will focus on developing “prototype frontier AI capabilities to address critical national security challenges in across warfighting and enterprise domains.”
Before the company was awarded the lucrative contract, Amodei had a history of decrying Trump and urging voters to back Democrats. 
“But the stakes are too high for me not to say where I stand,&#8221; he wrote in a Facebook post before the 2024 election. &#8220;[Kamala] Harris will be the steadier hand and the more trustworthy leader in an age of rapid and disruptive technological change.&#8221;
Amodei did admit in the post that he was not speaking for Anthropic and that he would “try to find areas of agreement and opportunities for good policy making” regardless of who was elected.
Over the years, Amodei has donated extensively to Democrats, including $37,800 to President Joe Biden, $20,700 to Hillary Clinton, and $47,750 to the Democratic National Committee, <a href="https://www.fec.gov/data/receipts/?data_type=processed&amp;contributor_name=amodei%2C+dario">according</a> to Federal Election Commission records.
In another Facebook post from 2018, wrote that Trump “represents a serious and legitimate threat to the rule of law,” said that Trump “appoints idiots to important government positions,” and urged Americans to “vote against this clown.”
He said that a “feudal warlord lens” explained a lot about how Trump operates. 
“He sees the Attorney General as someone whose job is to protect him personally, rather than someone whose job is to enforce the laws, he sees the White House Counsel as responsible for abetting his illegal actions, rather than advising him on what is or isn’t legal,&#8221; he wrote. 
The CEO also opined on gerrymandering, urging the adoption of measures that “would effectively abolish the Electoral College.” He claimed that voting for Democrats was the only way to address gerrymandering in the country.
Last week, Dario <a href="https://www.anthropic.com/news/investing-in-energy-to-secure-america-s-ai-future">attended</a> an event with Trump last week at Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania as Anthropic committed $2 million to the university for AI and technology research.
Anthropic also has other close ties to Democratic donors and former Biden administration officials. 
During its early stages, the company received <a href="https://www.anthropic.com/news/anthropic-raises-124-million-to-build-more-reliable-general-ai-systems?utm_source=chatgpt.com">backing</a> from Dustin Moskovitz, a billionaire entrepreneur who donated around $37 million to a PAC backing Harris. Netflix founder Reed Hastings, another prominent Democrat donor, <a href="https://www.anthropic.com/news/reed-hastings">sits</a> on the board of Anthropic. Former Biden advisers who now <a href="https://www.semafor.com/article/05/30/2025/anthropic-emerges-as-an-adversary-to-trumps-big-bill">work</a> with Anthropic include Elizabeth Kelly, Tarun Chhabra, Benjamin Merkel, and Ben Buchanan.
Anthropic did not respond to a request for comment.
On Wednesday, Trump laid out details of his AI action plan, which included plans to require companies that get federal contracts to have ideologically free chatbots. The Daily Wire has <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ive-got-your-back-read-chatgpts-chilling-instructions-to-young-girl-seeking-covert-abortion?author=Leif+Le+Mahieu&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=‘I’ve+Got+Your+Back’%3A+Read+ChatGPT’s+Chilling+Instructions+To+Young+Girl+Seeking+Covert+Abortion">previously reported</a> on how OpenAi&#8217;s ChatGPT will help kids get access to abortion pills and attack crisis pregnancy centers, and on a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/we-tested-the-woke-ai-chatbot-used-to-train-nyc-teachers-heres-what-it-said?author=Mairead+Elordi&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=We+Tested+The+Woke+AI+Chatbot+Used+To+Train+NYC+Teachers.+Here%E2%80%99s+What+It+Said.">woke AI chatbot</a> used to train teachers in New York City.
Anthropic said that there was &#8220;alignment&#8221; between its goals and Trump&#8217;s action plan.
&#8220;We look forward to working with the Administration to implement these initiatives while ensuring appropriate attention to catastrophic risks and maintaining strong export controls,&#8221; Anthropic said Wednesday. &#8220;Together, we can ensure that powerful AI systems are developed safely in America, by American companies, reflecting American values and interests.&#8221;

World Economic Forum 2025

DOD Awards Massive AI Contract To Company Whose CEO Likened Trump To ‘Feudal Warlord’

Artificial Intelligence

The Pentagon agreed to purchase $400 million of preferred stock in MP Materials, which operates the only rare earth minerals mine in the United States, the company announced on Thursday.
The mine, located in Mountain Pass, California — 60 miles southwest of Las Vegas — extracts rare earth minerals that are vital for the U.S. military, CNBC <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/10/pentagon-to-become-largest-shareholder-in-rare-earth-magnet-maker-mp-materials.html">reported</a>. The Defense Department&#8217;s move is part of the Trump administration&#8217;s plan to break its dependence on China for rare earths, a goal that Interior Secretary Doug Burgum <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kL1kagSsIk8">discussed</a> in April.
“This initiative marks a decisive action by the Trump administration to accelerate American supply chain independence,” <a href="https://investors.mpmaterials.com/investor-news/news-details/2025/MP-Materials-Announces-Transformational-Public-Private-Partnership-with-the-Department-of-Defense-to-Accelerate-U-S--Rare-Earth-Magnet-Independence/default.aspx">said</a> James Litinsky, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of MP Materials. “We are proud to enter into this transformational public-private partnership and are deeply grateful to President Trump, our partners at the Pentagon, and our employees, customers and stakeholders for their unwavering support and dedication.”
Rare earths are used to produce magnets that are incorporated into critical U.S. military weapons systems, including those for drones, submarines, and the F-35 fighter jet, CNBC reported. Shortly after taking office, Trump <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/03/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-takes-immediate-action-to-increase-american-mineral-production/">signed</a> an executive order to ramp up American rare earth mining, bemoaning the fact that 70% of the United States&#8217; imports of rare earths come from China. Trump stated that he wants to make the United States “the leading producer and processor of non-fuel minerals, including rare earth minerals.”
China currently produces around 60% of the world&#8217;s rare earths and refines nearly 90%, <a href="https://www.csis.org/analysis/what-chinas-ban-rare-earths-processing-technology-exports-means">according</a> to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Rare earth minerals are also used to manufacture electronics, including smartphones and laptops, as well as electric vehicles and renewable energy technologies. After Trump levied tariffs on China, the communist country halted shipments of rare earth minerals to the United States. The administration <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/china/trump-says-deal-related-trade-was-signed-with-china-wednesday-2025-06-26/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">announced</a> late last month that it had reached an agreement with China to restart rare earth imports.
MP Materials&#8217; agreement with the Pentagon will result in the construction of the company&#8217;s &#8220;second domestic magnet manufacturing facility (the &#8217;10X Facility&#8217;) at a soon-to-be-chosen location to serve both defense and commercial customers.&#8221; The &#8220;10X Facility&#8221; is expected to be completed in 2028, which will boost MP Materials&#8217; manufacturing capacity to 10,000 metric tons, according to the company. The Pentagon&#8217;s agreement with MP Materials is for 10 years and establishes &#8220;a price floor commitment&#8221; to ensure that the company is protected from &#8220;non-market forces.&#8221;
Shares of MP Materials <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=mp+materials+stock&amp;rlz=1C5GCCM_en&amp;oq=mp+materials+stock&amp;gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqDQgAEAAYgwEYsQMYgAQyDQgAEAAYgwEYsQMYgAQyDQgBEAAYgwEYsQMYgAQyBwgCEAAYgAQyBwgDEAAYgAQyBwgEEAAYgAQyBwgFEAAYgAQyBwgGEAAYgAQyBwgHEAAYgAQyBwgIEAAYgAQyBwgJEAAYgATSAQgyOTIxajBqN6gCALACAA&amp;sourceid=chrome&amp;ie=UTF-8">jumped</a> nearly 50% on Thursday, hitting $44 as of Thursday morning. The company&#8217;s all-time high was $56.54, reached on April 1, 2022.
News of the agreement comes shortly after Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/tom-cotton-introduces-bill-to-break-chinas-monopoly-on-rare-earth-minerals-for-u-s-defense">introduced</a> a bill to expedite the extraction of rare earth elements in the United States, aiming to better protect America&#8217;s national security.
“Current environmental laws put our readiness to counter Communist China at risk and waste taxpayer dollars on projects that stall out and die on the vine,” Cotton <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/senate-republican-moves-give-u-s-edge-china-harvesting-minerals-weapons-systems">told</a> Fox News Digital. “This bill will create jobs, better arm and prepare our soldiers, and spend taxpayer dollars more efficiently.”

Defense Department Becomes Largest Shareholder Of Company That Owns America’s Lone Rare Earth Mine

Business

China

Pentagon

rare earth minerals

The legacy media have stonewalled letting President Trump have the win he deserves for his strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities. What President Trump did in Iran is one of the most historic wins of my lifetime.
Just to recap, Israel launched an overwhelming aerial assault on the Iranian facilities, nuclear and missile-based. They were going after ballistic missile development factories in Iran — their ballistic missile stockpiles, their missile launchers — as well as their nuclear facilities.
For nearly two weeks, Israel hammered the Iranians. But there was one facility in particular, Fordo, which was some 250-300 meters underground. And Israel did not have the ordnance capable of penetrating that facility. So President Trump authorized a B-2 strike using 30,000 pound bombs on Fordow, and in his words, “obliterated” the site.
The media won&#8217;t let that be the case, that President Trump used force to end the Iranian nuclear program and then declared the war over — and it was over.
It was, in fact, a historic win, and a win that we haven&#8217;t seen in American foreign policy in my lifetime: One strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities, a complete reshuffling of the deck in the Middle East with Israel as a regional powerhouse and Iran a supplicant, and no continuous war between Israel and Iran, no hot war continuing.
With no American casualties, by the way.
An amazing accomplishment.
But the media just won&#8217;t let President Trump have it. They won&#8217;t. They keep claiming over and over and over that, actually, maybe Fordo wasn&#8217;t destroyed. In fact, Fordo is fine. Maybe the Israeli-American effort was completely for naught, they claim.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2227-member-exclusive?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=The+Ben+Shapiro+Show&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Carousel">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
They have no basis upon which to say this, other than the word of Ayatollah Khamenei, who has been tweeting that everything is hunky dory from his bunker, presumably in Tehran, <a href="https://x.com/khamenei_ir/status/1938180907887698222">claiming</a> with astonishing chutzpah: 
<blockquote>With all that commotion and all those claims, the Zionist regime was practically knocked out and crushed under the blows of the Islamic Republic.</blockquote>
You have to be high on drugs to believe this. He was literally hiding in a bunker for the entirety of the war. His regime was so weak that the Israeli Air Force was flying continuous sorties unhindered over Iranian airspace, with zero casualties on the IAF side, zero, for two weeks.
And yet <a href="https://x.com/khamenei_ir/status/1938184845873844536">he says</a> that, in reality, the “Zionist regime,” Israel, was practically knocked out and crushed:
<blockquote>My congratulations on our dear Iran’s victory over the US regime. The US regime entered the war directly because it felt that if it didn’t, the Zionist regime would be completely destroyed. It entered the war in an effort to save that regime but achieved nothing.</blockquote>
The Baghdad Bob aspect in the Middle East is always absurd to Westerners. Ayatollah Khomeini trying to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, at least in terms of public perception, does not mean that he was not, in fact, hammered or that the nuclear program is intact.
But Khamenei <a href="https://x.com/khamenei_ir/status/1938185956793761808">tweeted out:</a>
<blockquote>The Islamic Republic delivered a heavy slap to the US’s face. It attacked and inflicted damage on the Al-Udeid Air Base, which is one of the key US bases in the region.</blockquote>
Nope. Actually, he called and he whined and begged the Qataris and the Americans to allow him to send a few missiles at the base, none of which actually hit.
Why am I telling you what Khamenei is saying? Because you&#8217;re hearing it echoed by the media. The New York Times and CNN reported that there was a Defense Intelligence Agency estimate that Fordo had not been knocked out, not been obliterated, not even been severely damaged.
It turned out that that was a low-confidence assessment by one of 18 intelligence agencies under the DIA. It didn’t matter. The media ran with it anyway. This became the top story in the media.
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How do we know that it&#8217;s stupid? According to the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/26/world/middleeast/centrifuges-fordo-damage-iran.html">UN nuclear watchdog</a> head, the director general of the IAEA, there was “no escaping significant physical damage after the U.S. strike on the Iranian facility.” Barak Ravid of Axios, a front man for Left-wing and isolationist agitprop coming out from various leak-driven parts of various administrations, <a href="https://x.com/BarakRavid/status/1938229914244682140">tweeted</a>, “I told Jake Tapper that a senior Israeli intelligence official told me that other than the word ‘obliterated’ the reality regarding the results of the attack on Iran is much closer to where Trump says it is than to where the initial DIA report said it was.”
All of this came to a head yesterday when Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth did a press conference. He crushed the fake news that&#8217;s been targeting President Trump, declaring:
<blockquote>Because you cheer against Trump so hard — it&#8217;s like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump because you want him not to be successful so bad — you have to cheer against the efficacy of these strikes. You have to hope maybe they weren&#8217;t effective. Maybe the way the Trump administration represented them isn&#8217;t true. So let&#8217;s take half-truths, spun information, leaked information, and then spin it. Spin it in every way we can to try to cause doubt and manipulate the public mind over whether or not our brave pilots were successful.
This was an historically successful attack. We should celebrate it as Americans, and it gives us a chance to have peace, a chance to have a deal and an opportunity to prevent a nuclear Iran, which is something President Trump talked about for 20 years.</blockquote>
He was correct.
Hegseth wasn’t done. He called on Jennifer Griffin of Fox News, who&#8217;d been one of the people who reported this particular DIA assessment.
<blockquote>Griffin: Do you have certainty that all the highly enriched uranium was inside the Fordo mountain, or some of it, because there were satellite photos that showed more than a dozen trucks there two days in advance. Are you certain none of that highly enriched uranium was moved?</blockquote>
<blockquote>Hegseth: Of course, we&#8217;re watching every single aspect. But, Jennifer, you&#8217;ve been about the worst, the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says.
Griffin: I was reporting about the ventilation shafts on Saturday night. And in fact, I was the first to describe the B-2 bombers, the refueling, the entire mission with great accuracy. So I take issue with that.
Hegseth: I appreciate you acknowledging that this was the most successful mission, based on operational security, that this department has done since you&#8217;ve been here. I appreciate that. So, we&#8217;re looking at all aspects of intelligence and making sure we have a sense of what was what.</blockquote>
Hegseth got feisty with the media, and a lot of it was deserved. Some of the questions he was asked were absolutely ridiculous. He was asked by a reporter about the fact that he had suggested that it was “brave boys” who flew the plane when one of the people in the plane was a woman, and here was his response:
<blockquote>So when I say something like our boys and bombers, see, this is the kind of thing the press does, right? Of course. The chairman mentioned a female bomber pilot. That&#8217;s fantastic. She&#8217;s fantastic. She&#8217;s a hero. I want more female bomber pilots. I hope the men and women of our country sign up to do such brave and audacious things.
But when you spin it as, because I say “our boys,” — and bombers is a common phrase — I&#8217;ll keep saying things like that, whether they&#8217;re men or women. Very proud of that female pilot. Just like I&#8217;m very proud of those male pilots. And I don&#8217;t care if it&#8217;s a male or a female in that cockpit, and the American people don&#8217;t care. But it&#8217;s the obsession with race and gender in this department that&#8217;s changed priorities. And we don&#8217;t do that anymore. We don&#8217;t play your little games.</blockquote>
You could see how deeply, deeply annoyed Hegseth was along with the entire administration, having to explain that when you drop 12 bunker-busters on an Iranian nuclear site and destroy their nuclear facilities — or at the very least render them completely inoperable — and then the media lie about it and seek any speck of information to discredit that — it is deeply annoying.
And it should be deeply annoying. The media refuse to give President Trump the win he deeply deserves.
Simply put, they are trash.

Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth Holds Pentagon Press Conference On Iran Strikes

Hegseth Wrecks Trump-Hating Media

Ben Shapiro

Iran

Iran Airstrike

Legacy Media

Middle East

Opinion

President Trump

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan “Razin” Caine in a Thursday press conference with Defense Secratary Pete Hegseth provided a detailed description of the American strikes and released video showing how bunker-buster bombs crippled Iran&#8217;s nuclear facilities.
Caine revealed that the United States military had developed the GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator, better known as bunker buster bombs, more than 15 years ago, specifically with Iran’s nuclear program in mind.
He showed several military graphics and videos showcasing exactly how the bombers were to inflict extensive damage at Iran&#8217;s Fordo nuclear site.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
Gen. Dan &#8220;Razin&#8221; Caine demonstrates how GBU-57 MOPs work: &#8220;Unlike a normal surface bomb, you won&#8217;t see an impact crater because they&#8217;re designed to deeply bury and then function &#8230; All six weapons at each vent at Fordow went exactly where they were intended to go.&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/iQs3oWcJ4X">pic.twitter.com/iQs3oWcJ4X</a>
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) <a href="https://twitter.com/RapidResponse47/status/1938215092128231753?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 26, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
“All six weapons at each vent at Fordo went exactly where they were intended to go. A bomb has three effects that causes damage: blast, fragmentation, and overpressure,” Caine said. “In this case, the primary kill mechanism in the mission space was a mix of overpressure and blast ripping through the open tunnels and destroying critical hardware.“
Thursday&#8217;s press conference comes after the Trump administration accused CNN, The New York Times, and other legacy media outlets of attempting to torpedo the success of the strikes, quoting a leaked preliminary assessment that said the attack only set Iran’s nuclear program back by months.
“The majority of the damage we assessed based on our extensive modeling was a blast layer combined with the impulse extending from the shock. Imagine what this looks like six times over,” Caine added.
The media asked Gen. Caine if he was pressured to provide a rosy assessment of the destruction at Fordo, to which he pushed back, “No, I have not, and no, I would not.”
The U.S. strike on Fordo primarily focused on two ventilation shafts as the “primary point of entry into the mission space,” Caine said.
“In the days preceding the attack against Fordo, the Iranians attempted to cover the shafts with concrete to try to prevent an attack,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I won’t share the specific dimensions of the concrete cap, but you should know that we know what the dimensions of those concrete caps were. The planners had to account for this. They accounted for everything.”
“The cap was forcibly removed by the first weapon, and the main shaft was uncovered. Weapons two, three, four, five were tasked to enter the main shaft, move down into the complex at greater than 1,000 feet per second, and explode in the mission space. Weapon number six was designed as a flex weapon to allow us to cover if one of the preceding jets or one of the preceding weapons did not work. There were six on each side.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/thejointstaff?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@thejointstaff</a> Chairman General Dan Caine describes the devastating weaponry dropped on Fordow in last Saturday&#8217;s strikes: <a href="https://t.co/Ol9SE9rmvN">pic.twitter.com/Ol9SE9rmvN</a>
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) <a href="https://twitter.com/RapidResponse47/status/1938214162812879293?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 26, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Pete Hegseth – Dan Caine holds a joint press conference in DC

WATCH: Gen. ‘Razin’ Caine Unveils Footage Demonstrating Fordo Collapse After Devastating Iran Strike

Fordo

News

Nuclear

Trump Administration

U.S.

Seven B-2 bombers that took off from an air base in Missouri early Saturday morning returned home just before noon on Sunday after conducting a bombing run over Iranian nuclear facilities.
The B-2 pilots touched back down at Whiteman Air Force Base after a roughly 36-hour flight to Iran and back. The mission, dubbed Operation Midnight Hammer, involved decoys and multiple in-flight refuelings for the strike team to get to Iran and back, Joint Chiefs Chairman Dan Caine explained at a Sunday press conference.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
NEW VIDEO: B-2 bombers land back at Whiteman Air Force Base today in Knob Noster, Missouri, after about a 36-hour flight to strike targets in Iran. 
Seven B-2s took off from Whiteman just after 12 a.m. on Saturday. The first bombers back landed just before 12 p.m. Sunday. <a href="https://t.co/g7IbwWD6NH">pic.twitter.com/g7IbwWD6NH</a>
&mdash; Matt Evans (@MattEvansKMBC) <a href="https://twitter.com/MattEvansKMBC/status/1936858341910733208?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 22, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
As the bombers crossed the Atlantic and resumed flight over land, a team of fighters joined to cover the bombers on their entry into Iranian airspace.
“As the Operation Midnight Hammer strike package entered Iranian airspace, the U.S. employed several deception tactics, including decoys, as the 4th and 5th generation aircraft pushed out in front of the strike package at high altitude and high speed, sweeping in front of the package for enemy fighters and surface to air missile threats,” said Caine.
The bomber team appears to have entered Iranian airspace and reached their targets without alerting Iran’s military.
“As the strike package approached Fordo and Natanz, the US protection package employed high-speed suppression weapons to ensure safe passage of the strike package with fighter assets employing preemptive suppressing fires against any potential Iranian surface to air threats,” Caine continued. “We are currently unaware of any shots fired at the US strike package on the way in.”
The bomber struck targets at Fordo and Natanz beginning around 6:40 p.m. ET. Tomahawk missiles fired from a United States submarines hit Isfahan moments later. The entire attack took place within a 25-minute window between 6:40 p.m. and 7:05 p.m. ET.
“Following weapons release, the midnight hammer strike package exited Iranian airspace, and the package began its return home. We are unaware of any shots fired at the package on the way out. Iran&#8217;s fighters did not fly, and it appears that Iran&#8217;s surface-to-air missile systems did not see us. Throughout the mission, we retained the element of surprise,” Caine said.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Chairman Caine just laid out the PERFECT execution of Operation MIDNIGHT HAMMER. <a href="https://t.co/11NpibQhbi">pic.twitter.com/11NpibQhbi</a>
&mdash; DOD Rapid Response (@DODResponse) <a href="https://twitter.com/DODResponse/status/1936768363306307763?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 22, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/warriors-read-hegseths-full-statement-to-america-regarding-strike-on-irans-nuclear-facilities?author=Hank+Berrien&amp;category=undefined&amp;elementPosition=11&amp;row=3&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+News&amp;rowType=Vertical+Carousel&amp;title=%E2%80%98Warriors%E2%80%99%3A+Read+Hegseth%E2%80%99s+Full+Statement+To+America+Regarding+Strike+On+Iran%E2%80%99s+Nuclear+Facilities">praised</a> the strike team and others involved in the operation after its success.
“I want to recognize pilots who flew those bombers; who flew those fighters; who flew those refuelers: Warriors. I want to recognize the sailors, on those destroyers, in those subs. on those carriers: Warriors. All of them. I want to recognize our soldiers doing air defense, base defense, QRF: Warriors. All of them,” Hegseth said in a statement after the strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. “Every American involved in this operation performed flawlessly.”

B-2 Spirit Stealth Bomber

B-2 Bombers Arrive Back In Missouri After Hammering Iranian Nuclear Sites

Missouri

United States

Colonel Nathan McCormack, who was tasked with helping advise the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on Israel-related matters, has been removed from his position after his anti-Israel social media posts were brought to light.
McCormack, who was the Levant and Egypt branch chief at the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s J5 planning directorate, according to his LinkedIn, posted several controversial tweets on his X account. He called Israel a “death cult” and referred to the Israeli government as “Netanyahu and his Judeo-supremacist cronies,” among other things, <a href="https://www.jns.org/chief-israel-planner-at-pentagon-bashes-jewish-state-publicly-extensively/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jewish News Syndicate </a><a href="https://www.jns.org/chief-israel-planner-at-pentagon-bashes-jewish-state-publicly-extensively/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>.
A Joint Staff official told The Daily Wire that the Department of Defense said McCormack was removed from his position with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and that the matter is being handed over to the U.S. Army for further action.
The official added that McCormack’s posts do not reflect the position of the Joint Staff or the Department of Defense.
“Our global alliances and partnerships are vital to our national security, enhancing our collective defense, deterrence, and operational reach,” the official said.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-has-been-clear-for-14-years-that-iran-cannot-have-a-nuclear-weapon?author=Kassy+Akiva&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trump+Has+Been+Clear+For+14+Years+That+Iran+Cannot+Have+A+Nuclear+Weapon" target="_blank" rel="noopener">TRUMP HAS BEEN CLEAR FOR 14 YEARS THAT IRAN CANNOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON</a>
McCormack’s semi-anonymous account has been deleted following JNS’s report.
The J5 directorate of the Joint Chiefs of Staff advises the chairman of the Joint Chiefs on military strategy, planning, and policy across a wide range of national security issues. McCormack’s role tasked him with preparing senior leadership to speak with partner nations —including Israel.
McCormack made the posts on an X account where he calls himself “Nate,” but has posted several times about his job and even <a href="https://archive.ph/ox92m" target="_blank" rel="noopener">shared a photo</a> of his Meritorious Service Medal certificate.
Since assuming his position — which his LinkedIn says he began in June 2024 — McCormack has posted numerous times about his views on the Jewish state, especially after Hamas’s October 7 massacre of Israeli civilians.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/live-updates-israel-strikes-iran?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Daily+Wire&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=LIVE+UPDATES%3A+Trump+Calls+For+Iran+To+Surrender%2C+Says+The+Ayatollah+Is+An+%E2%80%98Easy+Target%E2%80%99" target="_blank" rel="noopener">LIVE UPDATES: Trump Calls For Iran To Surrender, Says The Ayatollah Is An ‘Easy Target’</a>
“The Western states go to great lengths to avoid criticism of Israel, much out of Holocaust guilt,” McCormack <a href="https://archive.ph/2025.06.17-203853/https://x.com/mick_or_mack/status/1909570169850016150" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tweeted in April</a>.
In May, <a href="https://archive.ph/2025.06.17-203737/https://x.com/mick_or_mack/status/1926700593134915740" target="_blank" rel="noopener">he posted</a> that “Netanyahu and his Judeo-supremacist cronies are determined to prolong the conflict for their own goals: either to remain in power or to annex the land.”
In April 2024, <a href="https://archive.ph/2025.06.17-203813/https://x.com/mick_or_mack/status/1777077484426543148" target="_blank" rel="noopener">McCormack questioned</a> if the United States was a proxy of Israel.
“I’ve lately been considering whether we might be Israel’s proxy and not realized it yet,” he posted. “Our worst ‘ally.’ We get literally nothing out of the ‘partnership’ other than the enmity of millions of people in the Middle East, Africa and Asia.”
According to JNS, in response to a post about Gazans potentially seeking refuge outside the Gaza Strip, McCormack claimed that Israel aims “to expel them and cleanse ‘Eretz Israel’ of ethnic Palestinians.”
Before starting his role with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but while still serving as a U.S. Army officer, McCormack shared his views following Hamas’s October 7 massacre of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/we-had-to-act-netanyahu-reveals-why-he-struck-iran-in-first-interview-since-rising-lion-launch?author=Kassy+Akiva&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=‘We+Had+to+Act’%3A+Netanyahu+Reveals+Why+He+Struck+Iran+In+First+Interview+Since+‘Rising+Lion’+Launch" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Israeli</a> civilians.
“I agree that Israel has an absolute right to respond militarily, and that civilians may legally be caught in the crossfire, but you are ignoring the requirement of proportionality,” McCormack <a href="https://archive.ph/2025.06.17-203744/https://x.com/mick_or_mack/status/1712058063039967375" target="_blank" rel="noopener">posted</a>. “Israel’s responses always (always—not hyperbole) disproportionately target Palestinian civilians.”
McCormack has also disclosed details about his official duties on the account, <a href="https://archive.ph/2025.06.17-204215/https://x.com/mick_or_mack/status/1822968484378075143" target="_blank" rel="noopener">claiming in</a> August 2024 that “we” warned Israel it would be “fuxked” if it escalated into an offensive against Lebanon. Despite the warning, Israel launched an invasion two months later and decimated the terrorist group Hezbollah. He also shared information about his conversations and briefings with Israeli Defense Forces officers.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/irans-supreme-leader-responds-to-israels-attack?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Kassy+Akiva&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=Iran%E2%80%99s+Supreme+Leader+Responds+To+Israel%E2%80%99s+Attack" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IRAN’S SUPREME LEADER RESPONDS TO ISRAEL’S ATTACK</a>
McCormack’s account also shared information about his movements and work trips <a href="https://archive.ph/2025.06.17-203856/https://x.com/mick_or_mack/status/1933610456154857488" target="_blank" rel="noopener">being canceled</a>, according to JNS.
On Monday, McCormack reportedly claimed the Department of Defense endorses the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry’s casualty numbers.
“Along with the World Health Organization and United Nations, we (Department of Defense, Department of State and the U.S. Intelligence Community) consider the Gaza Health Ministry figures to be generally reliable (though not precise),” he wrote, “but probably less so now than they were originally due to the general destruction and chaos in Gaza.”
The Department of Defense has strict social media guidelines, including telling service members to “avoid use of Department of Defense titles, insignia, uniforms or symbols in a way that could imply DoD sanction or endorsement of content on your personal page.”

Col. Nathan McCormack c

Pentagon Official Removed From Joint Chiefs Of Staff For Anti-Israel Posts

Global Politics

Israel

Joint Chiefs of Staff

U.S. Army

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth celebrated the 250th birthday of the United States Army on Saturday, telling his former colleagues at &#8220;Fox &amp; Friends: Weekend&#8221; that without the creation of a cohesive fighting force in 1775, the events that followed in 1776 would not have been possible.
Hegseth raised the point in defense of President Donald Trump&#8217;s plan to host a parade in Washington, D.C., celebrating Flag Day and the Army&#8217;s 250th birthday.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
. <a href="https://twitter.com/SecDef?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@SecDef</a> “There is no 1776 without 1775.” 💪🏼💪🏼💪🏼 <a href="https://t.co/i4aqTjdvYF">pic.twitter.com/i4aqTjdvYF</a>
— DOD Rapid Response (@DODResponse) <a href="https://twitter.com/DODResponse/status/1933885942831489044?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
&#8220;It&#8217;s because of strong men and women who stand up and are willing to fight for it,&#8221; Hegseth began. &#8220;There is no 1776 without 1775, and that&#8217;s why the president is right to celebrate it today. The haters can hate, let &#8217;em. We don&#8217;t care. This is celebrating 25o years of freedom and strength.&#8221;
&#8220;Do you know why I joined the military in large part?&#8221; Hegseth asked then. &#8220;Because of a parade that went down Main Street of Wanamingo, Minnesota — in southern Minnesota — that, as a young kid, my parents used to take me to and I would see the dozen vets walking down the street. And I&#8217;d look up and say, &#8216;Man, look at what they did. Maybe someday I could do that.'&#8221;
<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/gift/?utm_medium=website&amp;utm_source=wisepops&amp;utm_campaign=dad&amp;utm_content=fathersdaygiftpopups" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gift Dad an All Access Membership. Use code DAD40 at checkout to save 40%!</a>
&#8220;You know, imagine the effect of the American people seeing the hardware and the men and women, and the parades of who we are and how we defend freedom — we believe that will motivate. We believe that supports recruitment. That supports morale. That supports the general sense and the feeling that President Trump talks about all the time that America&#8217;s back! And we&#8217;re here to stay. And our allies know that and our enemies are on notice.&#8221;
The U.S. Army also posted a video celebrating the milestone, saying that the service branch&#8217;s mission — even 250 years later — was still the same, and could be boiled down to just three words: &#8220;This we&#8217;ll defend.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
After 250 years, it still comes down to three words.
THIS. WE&#8217;LL. DEFEND. 
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Army250?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Army250</a> <a href="https://t.co/4V3faxVa96">pic.twitter.com/4V3faxVa96</a>
— U.S. Army (@USArmy) <a href="https://twitter.com/USArmy/status/1933856987604734186?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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President Trump Holds “Make America Wealthy Again Event” In White House Rose Garden

Pete Hegseth Celebrates The U.S. Army’s 250th Birthday: ‘There Is No 1776 Without 1775’

Pete Hegseth Celebrates The U.S. Army's 250th Birthday: 'There Is No 1776 Without 1775'

1776

Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) immediately regretted his decision to demand an example from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of a medical research project that he believed the Defense Department was justified in terminating.
Hegseth appeared on Wednesday before the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Durbin used some of his time in an attempt to attack Hegseth by claiming that, under his leadership, the Defense Department was cutting funding to vital medical research efforts.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
SEN. DURBIN: &#8220;Give me an example of a &#8216;boondoggle&#8217; in medical research &amp; defense health.&#8221;
SEC. HEGSETH: &#8220;We&#8217;re talking about some stuff I shouldn&#8217;t say in public. You know, marbles in the rear ends of cats, tens of millions of dollars.&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/0qOkozf9p7">pic.twitter.com/0qOkozf9p7</a>
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) <a href="https://twitter.com/Breaking911/status/1932867157135696174?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 11, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Durbin began by touting his own actions, saying that during his tenure on that committee they had &#8220;dramatically increased the medical research to protect the men and women in uniform &#8230; It is enough for me that they risk their lives for our country. We shouldn&#8217;t make it a more dangerous situation, and we ought to understand what&#8217;s going on in their minds and their bodies when they serve.&#8221;
He then turned to Hegseth, complaining that millions of dollars in research projects had been canceled since he became Defense Secretary: &#8220;Your budget cuts two thirds — two thirds of that amount for defense health research. How can that be consistent with our mutual goal of making the military life a safer life for our men and women in uniform?&#8221;
&#8220;Senator, I would take issue with your characterization that all two-thirds of that — whatever was reduced — is focussed on the issues that you just spoke about,&#8221; Hegseth replied, saying that if the funding had been used for research that improved service members&#8217; lives, he would support it.
&#8220;My team knows that&#8217;s exactly the type of research that we would fund,&#8221; Hegseth continued. &#8220;But we did find lots of other research inside the Defense Department to the tens of millions and in some cases hundreds of millions of dollars that was a boondoggle for the American people.&#8221;
&#8220;Give me an example of a &#8216;boondoggle&#8217; in medical research and defense health,&#8221; Durbin interrupted.
&#8220;We&#8217;re talking about — some stuff I shouldn&#8217;t say in public. You know, marbles in the rear ends of cats, tens of millions of dollars. Things that don&#8217;t have —&#8221; Hegseth obliged.
Durbin, clearly wishing he could withdraw the question, attempted to deflect: &#8220;Is this like the 300 — 300 — is this like the 350-year-old Social Security check that the president told us about?&#8221;
&#8220;Senator, I respect completely the issue that you&#8217;re speaking with &#8230; the Defense Department has been a place where organizations, entities, and companies know they can get money almost unchecked whether or not it actually applies to things that happen on the battlefield. That&#8217;s what we worked very hard to find in ways that other secretaries have not. This committee and others talk about waste, fraud, and abuse all the time. We have actually gone after waste, fraud, and abuse. Because every dollar that was spent is another dollar we can pour into the war-fighters.&#8221;
Durbin tried one last time, saying that cutting two-thirds of the spending — would not &#8220;Make America Great Again&#8221; for the families of service members: &#8220;I don&#8217;t think so.&#8221; He did not address Hegseth&#8217;s point regarding the fact that much of the spending had been found to be &#8220;waste, fraud, and abuse&#8221; — and instead, he changed the subject to complain about the military parade scheduled for Flag Day.

Senator Dick Durbin

Top Democrat Demands Example Of Research The Defense Department Should Axe, Regrets It Immediately

Dick Durbin

research

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