A GOP senator lost his cool and demanded “straight answers” while questioning Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth about the Iran war.
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During a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Tuesday, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) repeatedly asked Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chair Dan Caine for clarity. The two Trump administration officials were defending the president’s request for supplemental funding for the ongoing Iran war.
As Kennedy turned to Hegseth to discuss the stakes in Iran, he prefaced one of his questions by saying, “We need some hard answers and some straight talk.” Then he asked, if the U.S. doesn’t continue its military campaign, “What will happen, Pete?”
Hegseth echoed comments by Caine, saying, “The likely outcome is they would try to impose their will on the waterways.”
“Would they toll in?” Kennedy asked, referring to the way Iran has tolled ships crossing the Strait of Hormuz.
“Call it a toll, call it a fee, call it an exchange, call it control,” Hegseth said. “They would do something. They would try to hold it.”
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“Would they try to commence development again of a nuclear warhead?” Kennedy asked.
Hegseth explained that part of the reason for President Donald Trump’s renewed strikes on Iran was that “they didn’t give up their ambitions, even though their nuclear sites had been obliterated,” adding, “This regime is hell-bent on nuclear ambitions.”
Before Hegseth could continue, Kennedy cut him off, saying, “We need straight answers. Do we have the ability to destroy whatever is underneath Pickaxe Mountain?”
Hegseth answered by telling him, “If anybody in the world can reach anything on this, on God’s green earth, it’s the United States military.”
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