House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) signaled over the past weekend that he will increase Democratic pressure in his campaign to get Department of War Secretary Pete Hegseth to resign or be removed from his position.
Jeffries announced his stance at a media appearance ahead of the midterm elections that will determine control of Congress.
“We’re going to hold him accountable in the same way that we held Pam Bondi and Kristi Noem accountable,” Jeffries told MS NOW on Saturday, referring to the Trump administration’s previous attorney general and Homeland Security secretary, respectively.
“And Pete Hegseth needs to be pushed aside by the president, or we’re going to have to deal with that situation if he is not,” Jeffries said, adding that Democrats are going to “run him out of town.”
When he was pressed on whether he would support a resolution that was introduced in the fall to impeach Hegseth, Jeffries said he would “act consistently with what I’ve said relative to Pete Hegseth from the very beginning: I called for Pete Hegseth to be fired by [President] Donald Trump in the spring of 2025.”
Outgoing Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) submitted articles of impeachment in September against Hegseth in response to the conflict in Iran, Yemen, boat strikes, and more since the start of the second Trump administration.
However, Jeffries stopped short of an explicit commitment to launching an impeachment inquiry into the Pentagon chief during his interview with MS NOW.
Currently, Republicans hold small majorities in both the House and Senate before the Nov. 3 elections, which will determine whether the GOP or Democrats control either or both congressional chambers.
If Democrats win the House, Jeffries would be poised to become the next speaker, replacing current House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).
In the upper congressional chamber, at least one Democrat, Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), said he wants Hegseth to testify before the slowdown of Starlink’s satellite service in Ukraine, which Kyiv said has disrupted its military operations amid its conflict with Russia.
Military-grade service was restored on Saturday, officials said.
“Defense Secretary Hegseth should be brought in. Anyone who has knowledge of what happened,” Schiff said on Sunday in an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Elon Musk, the owner of Starlink and SpaceX, said Saturday that Ukraine had violated the company’s terms of service agreements but that his company “has done more to defend Ukraine than any private company on Earth by far.”
President Donald Trump has held many campaign-style rallies to boost his preferred Republican candidates in numerous states, while former President Barack Obama also recently held a campaign event in Ohio this month to support Democratic candidates.
A White House X account on Monday wrote that Trump will be visiting locations in Mississippi, Texas, Florida, Ohio, and Iowa this week, while Vice President JD Vance will visit Montana, Kansas, and Michigan with “more to come” in the future.
The White House did not immediately respond to an Epoch Times request for comment.
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