MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell And Elizabeth Warren Crack Up Over Big Moment At Trump Pick Pete Hegseth’s Confirmation Hearing
MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) laughed as they lampooned a key moment at Trump Defense Department nominee Pete Hegseth’s confirmation hearing.
Hegseth’s nomination seemed precarious after several bombshell revelations, but the path has cleared since then and despite intense grilling by Democrats at the Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing Tuesday, Hegseth now seems poised to be confirmed.
At that hearing, Warren and Hegseth generated laughter in the gallery with an exchange about whether Hegseth would pledge not to “go directly into the defense industry for 10 years” following his tenure.
On Wednesday night’s edition of MSNBC’s The Last Word, O’Donnell and Warren cracked up as they mimicked the exchange, but with Warren answering the question in a more direct manner:
(VIDEO CLIP)
WARREN: I understand that. I just need a yes or no here — time is short. I just need a yes or no.
HEGSETH: I would consult with the president about what the policy be at the Defense Department.
WARREN: In other words, you’re quite sure that every general who serves should not go directly into the defense industry for 10 years. You’re not willing to make that same pledge?
HEGSETH: I’m not a general, Senator.
(LAUGHTER)
WARREN: You’ll be the one — let us just be clear, in charge of the generals, so you’re saying, sauce for the goose but certainly not sauce for the gander?
HEGSETH: I would want to see what the policy of the president —
WARREN: Oh, I bet you would.
CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Senator Warren.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O’DONNELL: Leading off our discussion tonight is Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. She’s a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and the Senate Finance Committee and others.
Senator, I want to begin exactly where you left off there and by the way, let me start with a question you maybe haven’t thought of. Will you go to work for a defense contractor when you leave the Senate? And if you haven’t thought about it, take your time and think about it.
WARREN: I haven’t thought about it and the answer is no.
O’DONNELL: Seems pretty easy.
WARREN: Yeah, it seems pretty easy and that’s the whole point. He has thought about this he has thought about the corrosive effect of the revolving door, and I agree. It is a corrosive effect. We really need to slow that down.
And that’s why I was so glad that our current secretary of defense, Lloyd Austin, four years ago when he sat in that very same chair, made the commitment that he would not go into the defense industry.
You know, that is the point. Lloyd Austin wanted to make clear he is here to serve the American people. Pete Hegseth makes clear he is here to serve Pete Hegseth.
O’DONNELL: This is entirely about lowering standards, more — more so than any Senate confirmation hearing I’ve ever seen. This is a direct request, lower the standards below anything you’ve ever dreamed of.
WARREN: Right.
You know, what’s really remarkable about this — we sit on Senate armed services and as you know, we have to vote on everybody who hits levels of general in the — in the military and the kinds of things that Pete Hegseth have — that have been documented, these were not just kind of rumors floating out there about taking people to strip clubs and getting so drunk, he want — at work event climbing up on stage to dance with the strippers about having to be carried up to his room because he was so drunk at a work event, sexual harassment claims against him.
Frankly, that would have stopped the career of anyone in the military from making it to those higher echelons. And yet, the United States Senate is being asked and evidently Republicans are responding to say that’s the person who will be in charge of America’s military.
Watch above via MSNBC’s The Last Word.
