Seth Moulton Says Sec. Pete Hegseth Is A 'Danger' To US National Security Following 2nd Signal Scandal

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA) joined "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss Sec. Pete Hegseth following the second Signal chat scandal.

Transcript

00:00I'm Brittany Lewis, a breaking news reporter here at Forbes. Joining me now is Congressman Seth

00:04Moulton. Congressman, thank you so much for joining me. It's good to be back. Thanks for

00:08having me. News of a second signal scandal broke over the weekend. Last month, in a chat that

00:15included his wife, his brother, and lawyer, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly shared

00:21details about an upcoming attack on the Houthis in Yemen. To start off this conversation,

00:25what's your reaction to this new signal story? Well, first of all, I'm not surprised. As someone

00:32who can't be trusted once, can't be trusted a lot. And just in the same way that this guy can't be

00:37trusted in all aspects of his personal life, he's professionally totally untrustworthy,

00:43completely unqualified to do this job. And he himself has become a danger to the national

00:50security of the United States. This is very serious. I want to talk about the differences

00:55here between the first signal gate and this story because National Security Advisor Michael

01:01Waltz last time inadvertently added the Atlantic's editor to the chat. This was a completely different

01:07chat. It reportedly was made before Pete Hegseth was confirmed. It included his family members as

01:13well as his lawyers. What are your thoughts on the difference here? I mean, it seems a lot worse,

01:19but the bottom line is that both are completely illegal. By the Department of Defense's own

01:25classification guidance, the details Secretary Hegseth shared are classified. And actually,

01:31they're classified top secret. Now, it's illegal even to share what's called sensitive but unclassified

01:38information on a signal chat. It's an unsecure platform, and it often exists on personal phones

01:45that can be hacked by our adversaries. In fact, some of their top targets are people like Pete Hegseth

01:50and his associates. So this is dangerous. It's illegal, no matter who you're talking to. And it's

01:59especially dangerous because the top secret information he shared could be used by our adversaries to shoot

02:06down our own pilots. Pete Hegseth tried to tamp down concerns today at the White House's Easter egg

02:13roll. He said to reporters essentially that this was an old story. He blamed the media. He said that

02:19the media is taking, quote, anonymous sources from disgruntled former employees, and then they try to

02:24slash and burn people and ruin their reputations. Not going to work with me because we're changing the

02:29Defense Department. He didn't deny what happened, though. What's your thoughts on how he characterized it?

02:35You learn in the military. I remember this from day one of Marine training is that integrity matters

02:41above all else. So you might drop out of a run and they'll let you try again. You might fail a test

02:46and you can take it again. But if you lie about anything in the Marine Corps, you're going home

02:50that afternoon. Well, Segseth continues to lie about this. He's not taking accountability for his own

02:58actions. And as a result, he cannot be trusted. He's clearly not trusted by his own closest

03:05advisors. What do you think the troops think about it? Well, I know because I've heard from a lot of

03:09them that they are disgusted by this behavior from the top person in the Pentagon because they know

03:15that they would be fired in a heartbeat, probably prosecuted criminally, if they did what the

03:23Secretary of Defense has done and is now lying about himself.