WASHINGTON – Yesterday,U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) joined “Kudlow” on Fox Business Network to discuss President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Pete Hegseth to be the U.S. Secretary of Defense. Earlier that day, Senator Tuberville had met with Pete Hegseth to discuss his vision for the Pentagon. Senator Tuberville also discussed the nomination of Kash Patel to be the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Excerpts from Senator Tuberville’s interview can be found below and his full interview can be found on Rumble or YouTube.
ON MEETING WITH MR. PETE HEGSETH:
KUDLOW: “Alrighty. Senator Tommy Tuberville has just come from a meeting with Pete Hegseth on Capitol Hill just a few moments ago. Mr. Hegseth nominated to be Defense Secretary. Senator Tuberville, as always, sir, great to see you. So, give us your, you know, give us your capsule on Pete Hegseth. What do you think here? Right choice, wrong choice. How do you see it?”
TUBERVILLE: “100% right choice, Larry. President Trump’s not—he’s not interested in business as usual because it’s gotten us in trouble. Pete is a patriot. He understands the military. [He’s served] twenty years, but he’s done other stuff too. He’s been in business. He’s well educated, well spoken. But what I like about him, Larry, is he’s a [younger] age. He’s going in, running our military, and we need somebody the age—close to the age of a lot of these warfighters that we have that they can relate [to]. This is a different military. This is a different time. This is a different era. And we need to build our military back because we have really degraded our military over the years because of the woke, the DEI, the critical race theory, all these things are being pushed at all of our warfighters, and they’re getting out right and left. We’ve got to build it back and Pete’s got to do it, Larry.”
KUDLOW: “Yeah, 100%. You know, look, I read in the left-wing media you know, all these attempts to smear Pete Hegseth. And I also read in conservative media that there are police reports that essentially let him off the hook. Okay? It’s much ado about nothing many years ago. Again, it’s more ankle-biting coming from the left. It’s very much like the other stuff we’ve seen. So, you think that’s gonna be an issue in the in the Senate hearings? I mean, to me, it’s open and shut for heaven sakes. The police report is this. It says nothing happened. They didn’t bring any charges. Now let’s get to the agenda you just talked about.” […]
TUBERVILLE: “Exactly. And you can read a lot about that. And you just said, Larry, the thing about Pete is he’s well-spoken. It’s all out there. People can look at it, but a lot of this stuff was years ago. Now again, you got to be responsible for your actions, but Pete has done everything he possibly can do to get it out there to talk to people. Again, when we get to the hearings, probably somewhere around January 9th or 10th, Larry, it’s gonna be about the military. It’s not gonna be about his past. […] Now the Democrats are gonna do everything they can to destroy probably one of the better people that we’ve ever had in as the possible appointee of Secretary of Defense. But that’s all they have. And they’re gonna try to destroy him. It’s not gonna work. He’s gonna work well with the military. He’s gonna build it back. He’s the type of person we have to have for all military, not just the Army, the Navy, the Air Force. He was in the Marines. He did exactly what he needed to do when he first stepped into this role saying, ‘Listen, we need to work together,’ and the Democrats can work with us if they want to, but if not, that’ll be fine. Pete Hegseth and the Republican Party can push this, and we can get our military back to the way it should be.”
ON NOMINATION OF KASH PATEL FOR DIRECTOR OF THE FBI:
KUDLOW: “And Senator Tuberville I’ll just add, he’s a highly decorated veteran. As I recall, two Bronze Stars. Fought in two—I believe two theaters of war—combat service, by the way. We haven’t had that in quite some time. So, my other point is this: you’re gonna get to these hearings. I don’t see why the FBI in its present condition – […] I don’t see why they should be allowed to vet anybody. They don’t deserve it. They haven’t earned it. Putting in Kash Patel and Pam Bondi and others to clean the corrupt stables of the Justice Department and the FBI. Why can’t the Senate—without the FBI—let the Senate do its own job with its own staff and come up with its own questions? That’s my last question to you, sir.”
TUBERVILLE: “We pretty much do that anyway, Larry. We’re not gonna listen to the Fake Bureau of Investigation. They’ve been off the rails now for the last four or five years. We need to make sure we do our own due diligence, and we’re doing that. We’re not gonna listen to a bunch of people that are gonna go after political appointees or former presidents and raid people’s homes, try to put people in jail. It is ridiculous. Kash Patel will be an excellent FBI director. He’s the type of person that we need, Larry. Larry, if you look at all the appointees, most of the people are younger, they’re diverse. President Trump knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s gonna need these people who’ll be working 15, 16, 17 hours a day, if not more. And these are the type of people that he’s picking because we got a lot of hard work to do and a lot of hills to overcome.”
KUDLOW: “Yes sir. Senator Tommy Tuberville. Thank you, sir. We appreciate your wisdom, as always.”
Senator Tommy Tuberville represents Alabama in the United States Senate and is a member of the Senate Armed Services, Agriculture, Veterans’ Affairs, and HELP Committees.
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