Top Adviser to Hegseth Placed on Leave in Pentagon Leak Probe
An official told Reuters that Daniel Caldwell was placed on administrative leave due to “an authorized disclosure.”
Reuters reported that Dan Caldwell, a top adviser to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, is on administrative leave due to “an authorized disclosure.”
Security officers escorted Caldwell from the Pentagon and suspended his access.
Hegseth’s chief of staff signed a memo on March 21, requesting “an investigation into ‘recent unauthorized disclosures of national security information involving sensitive communications.'”
Not much more has come out about the situation. Reuters provided more background information about Caldwell:
His importance was underscored in a leaked text chain on Signal disclosed by The Atlantic last month.
In it, Hegseth named Caldwell as the best staff point of contact for the National Security Council as it prepared for the launch of strikes against the Houthis in Yemen.
Caldwell had drawn attention in Washington for past views that critics have called isolationist, but which advocates said sought to right-size America’s defense priorities.
A Marine Corps veteran who deployed to Iraq, Caldwell was quoted saying before going to the Pentagon that America would have been better off if U.S. troops had just stayed home.
“I think the Iraq war was a monstrous crime,” Caldwell told the Financial Times in December 2024.
He was also a skeptic of U.S. military assistance to Ukraine and advocated for U.S. retrenchment from Europe.
Story in 3 parts.
Part 1: Concerns raised about Dan Caldwell pushing isolationist appointments at the Pentagon.
Part 2: Tucker claims it’s a smear campaign and Caldwell is a “man of genuine integrity.
Part 3: Caldwell put on leave after investigation into recent leaks. pic.twitter.com/4dXh5Bqivy
— AG (@AGHamilton29) April 15, 2025
Additional flashback: Caldwell praised appointment of Rob Malley as US envoy to Iran during the Biden admin.
Malley would go on to have his security clearance revoked amid an FBI investigation into mishandling of classified docs & a Tehran influence campaign in the State Dept. pic.twitter.com/eEC0FlV9Ut
— AG (@AGHamilton29) April 15, 2025
It’s rather predictable that a bunch of guys who clearly want a different ME foreign policy than the one Trump supports would be leaking to undermine Trump.
That’s why it raised red flags that they were being put in those positions in the first place. https://t.co/Kil91ODbAe
— AG (@AGHamilton29) April 15, 2025
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Comments
He’ll enjoy his new gig at CNN.
Typo in line 2 of the article: according to Reuters it was an “unauthorized disclosure”.
And also in the title.
To be clear, the typo exists in two places.
“Hegseth named Caldwell as the best staff point of contact for the National Security Council as it prepared for the launch of strikes against the Houthis in Yemen.”
This is what happens when Trump appoints a self acknowledged alcoholic, serial adulterer, and TV personality to be his Secretary of Defense. God help us all from Trump’s appointments.
Pffft…
I’m terribly sorry that Secretary Hegseth doesn’t measure up to your moth-eaten version of his accomplishments but I’ll take him every day of the week and twice on Sunday over the cavalcade of (bleep) that preceded him.
Just as Lincoln grappled with rumors of Grant’s drunkenness, find out what he drinks and I’ll have a carload of sorority sisters deliver a case of it as long as the armed forces are purged of woke and returned to lethality.
It’s not just Hegseth. Trump decimated the US military by appointing Mark Milley as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He has never apologized for this. God help us from any more military appointments from Trump. Then again, Trump was somehow??? able to get 5 deferments from military service during the Vietnam War, How many soldiers had to die in Viet Nam instead of Trump because Trump was too rich and privileged to serve?
What unit did you serve in, Junior? Got a DD214 that shows honorable service in a combat environment? Or any environment? From what you’ve said over at Althouse, you’re old enough to have served in Vietnam. Why didn’t you go? How many deferments did YOU get? Or did they just take one look at you and declare you 4-F?
You’ve descended from just a garden-variety mundane troll to a ridiculous caricature of one. You’re even worse than TransJayVee… at least he’s stupid and knows it. You’re too stupid to know how stupid you really are.
Take a hike, lamer.
How many had to die because of Trump? It’s been a few years since I was in history class but I’m pretty sure that fault rests at the feet of LBJ, not some snot nosed kid from Queens.
In any case, there’s no cure for your Trump derangement so I won’t try. Just stay away from the TV and you might survive the next 3.5 years.
Good luck.
Well actually it started with Kennedy. “Advisors” were sent to Vietnam under his watch. It might have actually started with Eisenhower. Major escalation was LBJ doing though.
I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings but the vast majority of the population isn’t interested in rehashing who served in Vietnam.
Milley was a mistake second only to ACB
Trump got some really bad advice in his first term. He was being set up to fail but (at that time) didn’t seem to realize it. He does now.
“This is what happens when Trump appoints a self acknowledged alcoholic, serial adulterer, and TV personality to be his Secretary of Defense.”
Cool. Now do Biden’s DEI-hire Lloyd Austin with his three-day AWOL routine, and his botched Afghanistan withdrawal that cost the lives of 13 American troops and hundreds of Afghans.
Sorry Pete. That was of course for JR, who won’t respond because he can’t.
It’s incredible the bile you like to spew. So bitter. Rather pitiful. Only to get in your digs. A progressive could do no better than your appropriation.
I suppose that he could have chosen the same kind of incompetent retard that Biden chose that got Americans killed with drawing from afghanistan.
Anyone think that JR here ever questioned even one of Biden’s worthless appointments?
I feel sorry for you wrapped in your blinding TDS destroying your life. What a bittler, small person.
Anyone who leaks classified information to a media whore should never ever be put in a trusted position again. Of course that means most of our politicians are similarly untrustworthy, They should also be prosecuted, fined, and jailed.
Maybe Carlson got it wrong. If this guy is a leaker, best to nip it in the bud before he might consider himself a Vindman.
His support for Malley is bad enough alone.
“His support for Malley is bad enough alone.”
One hundred per cent true. It’s a mystery to me why Malley isn’t in a Federal PMITA prison.
If he is a dedicated noninterventionist, he has policy differences with Trump right there,
if guilty
kick hard to the curb
I read somewhere there is a second advisor that was escorted out of the pentagon for the same offense. You know as much as you can rag on the SecDef for bad appointments you have to give him credit for discovering leakers so quickly and letting them be booted even though they were likely his friends and confidants.
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