Thomas Massie's articles of impeachment against Pete Hegseth have as much chance of seeing a Senate trial as Alejandro Mayorkas did two years ago – slim to none, especially not in the last weeks of this session of Congress. The Senate never took up Mayorkas' impeachment on grounds of dereliction of duty during the Biden Border Crisis. The GOP-led Senate didn't have the votes to remove Mayorkas and simply dismissed the impeachment without hearings.
Even if Massie manages to pass the articles before the end of the year, the GOP-led Senate will have better things to do with the few calendar days they have left. Nonetheless, Chuck Schumer declared yesterday that he wants to put Hegseth on trial. Hegseth responded this morning by telling Schumer, Bring it on:
Hegseth, asked about Schumer wanting to put him on trial: "This is what happens when you put people with ideological agendas in charge of institutions. If they want to talk about America's, or excuse me, President Trump's foreign policy and national security record. Let's do it. I'll see you there. Let's have a conversation about the success that I outlined here."
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) November 10, 2026
Hegseth dismissed Schumer and Massie as the authors of a "political spectacle" in his press conference this morning:
“It’s a farce and it’s a stunt and everybody knows it,” Hegseth said during a press conference at the Pentagon.
Hegseth said the effort sends a dangerous message to America’s enemies around the world. Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., reintroduced articles of impeachment Monday over the war with Iran and other military actions that were ordered by President Donald Trump.
Hegseth likened the effort to Congress’ two failed efforts to impeach Trump during his first term — first over a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the second over the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the U.S. Capitol.
“Both times they failed, both times he came back stronger, and the American people sent him back to the White House,” Hegseth said. “Now they’re trying a third time, this time against a member of his Cabinet. They will fail again, and if standing with President Trump puts me in that company, I’ll take that company every day of the week.”
Well ... yes, clearly. On Massie's part, this is a final attempt at revenge against Donald Trump, a PR stunt that has no chance of procedural success but will get him lots of media attention on his way out of Congress, a final act for a performative obstructionist who had delusions of being Rand Paul.
For Schumer, this is something else entirely, and Mayorkas is a parallel. Democrats oppose Trump's war with Iran but have no real way to stop it. They need two-thirds votes to overcome the certain vetoes that will result if Congress passes a War Powers Resolution in the next session to force Trump to withdraw forces from Iran. Schumer wants to put Hegseth on trial as a proxy for Trump in the war instead, in the same way Republicans wanted a trial for Mayorkas as a proxy for Joe Biden's open-borders policies.
The difference is that Senate Republicans understood that a trial would be futile and make them look impotent. Schumer either hasn't figured that out yet, even with Hegseth pointing it out today, or he's so desperate to hold onto his position that he will resort to chumming the base with red meat at all costs. There is zero chance of getting a dozen Republicans to flip on an impeachment of Hegseth over nothing at all. Schumer might have better luck getting them to sign onto a War Powers Resolution veto override, in fact, given the midterm debacle and the polling on the Iran War.
Massie's impeachment expires at the end of this session of Congress, but Democrats will almost certainly impeach Hegseth in the next session on the same basis. The problem, writes law professor and military lawyer Brian Cox on X/Twitter, is that the articles don't rise to "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors" as required by the Constitution. Other than the conflict over the legality of the War Powers Resolution (which Cox addresses at length), these are political disputes, and unlike Mayorkas, there is no dereliction of duty obvious either.
Cox concludes:
Each of the articles includes an assertion that SECWAR Hegseth "will remain a threat to the Constitution if allowed to remain in office," or words to that effect.
In reality, the articles of impeachment are a sham - from beginning to end. And it is Rep Massie, not Sec Hegseth, who IS a clear & present threat to the Constitution - for abusing the impeachment powers vested in Congress by distorting international AND domestic law to create the false appearance that Hegseth's conduct amounts to "high Crimes and Misdemeanors."
Thankfully, Rep Massie won't be allowed to remain in office himself since he got crushed in the primary in the great state of Kentucky.
Even so, any member of Congress who supports or votes in favor of Massie's misguided articles of impeachment is ALSO "a threat to the Constitution" - and for the same reason.
I'd add one word about the three WPR articles. First off, those do not bind the Secretary of War; they bind the President. Second: Congress has to act before it becomes a real conflict. Congress has yet to pass a resolution under the WPR and send it to Trump, and he can veto it when they do. Until they override the veto and Trump refuses to comply, there is no case, and that's before the question of constitutionality.
Anyway, Hegseth made clear today that he intends to stand and fight rather than retreat from the battleground Schumer threatens to create. That should surprise no one who knows Hegseth, who did multiple combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. A kangaroo court in the Senate will not give him the night sweats. And finally, Hegseth has the backing of the one man that matters:
So much for dumping Hegseth as a sop to the new Democrat majority, eh?