Pete Hegseth is in trouble, and he can only blame himself. Although the Fox News personality and Army National Guard veteran said on Wednesday that he’s still fighting to become Donald Trump’s next defense secretary, allegations of rape and alcohol abuse could derail his chances — if Senate Republicans care. There’s plenty for them to oppose, if they’re willing to defy Trump, because accusations of misconduct have troubled Hegseth’s nomination almost from the beginning. In November, the Washington Post reported that he paid a woman who accused him of raping her, though he denies committing an assault and was never charged with a crime. Hegseth’s behavior had been questionable for years. The New Yorker later obtained a whistleblower report saying that Hegseth got so intoxicated during his time leading Concerned Veterans of America that he would sometimes have to be carried out of events. Hegseth “sexually pursued” female staffers, The New Yorker reported, whom Hegseth and others had divided into two groups: “the ‘party girls’ and the ‘not party girls.’” He categorically denies these claims.
Even if the Senate fails to confirm Hegseth, he joins an unholy trinity as the third Trump nominee to face accusations of sexual assault. One, Matt Gaetz, withdrew as Trump’s pick for attorney general when it became clear the Senate would not confirm him after allegations that he had sex with a minor years earlier. The other is Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has been accused by a former babysitter for his children of forcibly groping her when she was in her 20s. The trio have much in common with the man who selected them. Trump was found liable for the sexual abuse of E. Jean Carroll in 2023, and dozens of women have alleged sexual harassment or misconduct at his hands.
Misogyny is not some accidental byproduct of Trump’s celebrity and later political career. Instead, it is central to his allure. The president-elect cannot be a strongman if he does not manifest traditional masculinity in its most honest form. Paternalism can appear benevolent, but it is about power and control, and its supporters find a natural leader in Trump. He seems dimly aware of his value, and so does his inner circle; his successful campaign for reelection included direct appeals to disaffected young men, and the much-ballyhooed gender gap failed to defeat him. As he prepares to take power, he empowers an anti-feminist backlash that has, in turn, long motivated much of the conservative movement.
The project begins with men like Hegseth, who is hardly the first conservative whose misconduct is superficially at odds with his ideology. He has fashioned himself a defender of traditional values, even a protector of women. Women should not fight in combat, he has argued, and he praised them instead for their contributions as caregivers and nurses. “They carried the banner of safety, peace, and care,” he wrote in his most recent book, The War on Warriors. “They were mothers, sisters, and angels of combat.” Hegseth’s praise hides a knife: He has also said that women can expect trouble if they stray from their prescribed roles. “If you train a group of men to treat women equally on the battlefield then you will be hard-pressed to ask them to treat women differently at home,” he wrote in the same book.
Look closely, and Hegseth’s conservatism is a license to abuse and exploit women. He evidently understands where that permission can lead. As editor of The Princeton Tory, a conservative publication, he published a student who claimed that sex with an unconscious person was not rape. The column was publicized by Popular Information in November, and it argued that in order for an act to be rape, there had to be a lack of consent but also “duress,” which a passed-out woman could not experience.
Hegseth still has defenders, including his own mother. Penelope Hegseth once told him that he mistreated women, writing in an email obtained by the New York Times that “on behalf of all the women (and I know it’s many) you have abused in some way, I say … get some help and take an honest look at yourself.” Now that he’s at at the mercy of senators, she sounds quite different. In a Wednesday interview with Fox News, she said her son is a “changed man” and added, “I just hope people will get to know who Pete is today, especially our dear female senators.” Conservative women have always been part of a permission structure that justifies and perpetuates misogyny; Hegseth’s mother is no different, and neither are the women who will fill out the Trump administration. Trump’s defenders will point to Susie Wiles, who will become the first female White House chief of staff in history when he takes office, or to Karoline Leavitt, who will be his press secretary, or perhaps to his wife, Melania, who has stood by the president-elect throughout his sexual abuse and misconduct scandals. Women know when they join Trump’s orbit that they’re laundering misogyny in the name of power or the pursuit of some ideological goal. Hegseth is merely the latest beneficiary of their efforts; Trump preceded him.
Whatever happens with Hegseth’s nomination, the fact that Trump persisted with it for so long is another reminder that his forthcoming administration will set women back. No one, not even the women who voted for Trump, will be entirely safe from its work. There is no task a woman can perform, no role she can fulfill, that will insulate her from the anti-feminist backlash that is already here. As Hegseth would no doubt remind her, not even military service is considered valuable enough to protect a woman from what an unrestrained conservative ideology will unleash. There are so many Hegseths. They might not be rich, or famous, but they are still dangerous. Now that they have a president in their own image, their fortunes are rising — to our detriment.
