{"id":2405488,"date":"2025-02-22T12:35:02","date_gmt":"2025-02-22T17:35:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-military-must-be-above-politics-democrats-sound-alarm-after-trumps-purge-at-pentagon-washington-examiner\/"},"modified":"2025-02-22T12:36:08","modified_gmt":"2025-02-22T17:36:08","slug":"the-military-must-be-above-politics-democrats-sound-alarm-after-trumps-purge-at-pentagon-washington-examiner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-military-must-be-above-politics-democrats-sound-alarm-after-trumps-purge-at-pentagon-washington-examiner\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018The military must be above politics\u2019: Democrats sound alarm after Trump\u2019s purge at Pentagon &#8211; Washington Examiner"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">34<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fthe-military-must-be-above-politics-democrats-sound-alarm-after-trumps-purge-at-pentagon-washington-examiner%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2405488&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The article\u2062 discusses a meaningful military \u2062shake-up initiated by President \u200bDonald Trump,leading to the firing of \u2062General Charles Q. Brown Jr.,the chairman of the Joint Chiefs \u200dof Staff. This decision has sparked backlash from Democrats,who argue that \u200dthe dismissals seem <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/breaking-kyle-rittenhouse-finally-released-on-2-million-cash-bond\/\" title=\"BREAKING: Kyle Rittenhouse FINALLY Released on  Million Cash Bond\">politically motivated<\/a>.\u200b Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth also\u200d terminated five other\u2064 Pentagon \u2063leaders, prompting concerns over the\u2063 potential politicization of the \u200bmilitary. Critics, including Sen. Jack Reed \u2063and rep. Jasmine Crockett, claim that these <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\">actions undermine military\u200c professionalism<\/a> and are targeted at officers due to their adherence to diversity \u2063and inclusion \u2062initiatives. Trump\u2063 justified the firings through \u2063a message suggesting that the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/white-house-releases-list-of-president-trumps-accomplishments-and-it-is-historic\/\" title=\"White House Releases List of ...\u2019s Accomplishments \u2013  And It Is Historic!\">previous administration<\/a> favored diversity over qualifications in military \u200bpromotions. Bipartisan lawmakers have expressed the need for clear\u2063 and apolitical criteria\u200b for such decisions, while \u2062other \u200cpolitical leaders, like Sen.Mark Kelly, have condemned these actions as disrespectful\u2064 to\u2064 military service.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<p><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><\/p>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><span class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-button\"><i class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-icon td-icon-mobile\"><\/i><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><span class=\"tdb-header-search-button-mob dropdown-toggle\" data-toggle=\"dropdown\"><i class=\"tdb-mobile-search-icon td-icon-search\"><\/i><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><span class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-button\"><i class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-icon td-icon-mobile\"><\/i><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<div class=\"tdb-drop-down-search\" aria-labelledby=\"td-header-search-button\">\n<div class=\"tdb-drop-down-search-inner\">\n<form method=\"get\" class=\"tdb-search-form\" action=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\"><\/form>\n<div class=\"tdb-aj-search\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/#\" role=\"button\" aria-label=\"Search\" class=\"tdb-head-search-btn dropdown-toggle\" data-toggle=\"dropdown\"><i class=\"tdb-search-icon td-icon-search\"><\/i><\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<h1 class=\"tdb-title-text\">&lsquo;The military must be above politics&rsquo;: Democrats sound alarm after Trump&rsquo;s purge at Pentagon<\/h1>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-title-line\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<div id=\"Brid_2016266\" class=\"tpd-featured-video bridtv\"><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/democrats\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Democrats\">Democrats<\/a> are slamming the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/trump-administration\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Democrats\">Trump administration<\/a> after firing the country&rsquo;s senior military officer as part of a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/fox-news-panics-demotes-maccallum-as-newsmax-rises\/\" title=\"Fox News Panics, Demotes MacCallum as Newsmax Rises\">major shake-<\/a>up at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/pentagon\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Democrats\">Pentago<\/a>n on Friday night, alleging that the move was politically motivated.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-paywall\">\n<p>President Donald Trump <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/policy\/defense\/3327009\/trump-fires-chairman-of-joint-staff-cq-brown\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">announced<\/a> Friday night he fired Gen.<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/charles-q-brown-jr\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\"> Charles Q. Brown Jr.<\/a>, the now-former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, while Secretary of Defense <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/pete-hegseth\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">Pete Hegseth<\/a> dismissed five other leaders from the Pentagon.The president said he will nominate Air Force Lt. Gen. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2882237\/man-behind-trump-plan-eradicate-isis-4-weeks\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">Dan &ldquo;Razin&rdquo; Caine<\/a> to the Joint Chiefs of Staff position, which will <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/white-house-chief-of-staff-tanden-will-be-confirmed-but-well-put-her-somewhere-else-if-shes-not\/\" title=\"White House Chief Of ...: Tanden Will Be Confirmed, But We\u2019ll Put Her Somewhere Else If She\u2019s Not\">require senate confirmation<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/white-house\/3292730\/all-executive-orders-actions-trump-first-day\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">FULL LIST OF EXECUTIVE ORDERS, ACTIONS, AND PROCLAMATIONS TRUMP HAS MADE AS PRESIDENT<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Trump announced his decision to fire General Brown in&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/114044712489265353\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">a message on Truth Social<\/a>, which reflected his belief that the Biden administration was too focused on diversity initiatives and passed over qualified nominees in the process.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Despite being highly qualified and respected to serve on the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the previous administration, General Caine was passed over for promotion by Sleepy Joe Biden,&rdquo; Trump wrote in the post.<\/p>\n<p>Hegseth had previously said General Brown should be dismissed because of his &ldquo;woke&rdquo; focus on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/military\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">military<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services committee, said he was &ldquo;troubled by the nature of these dismissals&rdquo; and said they appear &ldquo;to be part of a broader, premeditated campaign by President Trump and Secretary Hegseth to purge talented officers for politically charged reasons, which would undermine the professionalism of our military and send a chilling message through the ranks.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Hegseth fired Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead the Navy; Gen. James Slife, the vice chief of the Air Force; and the top lawyers for the Army, Navy, and Air Force. In response to the purge, Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) said &ldquo;Trump and his loyalists have continued to attack these brave men and women simply because they do not look like them.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Hegseth has suggested that Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti was only promoted because she is a woman&mdash;a suggestion that blatantly disregards her 20 years of operational experience and the fact she has commanded at every level and deployed in every Fleet,&rdquo; Crockett <a href=\"https:\/\/crockett.house.gov\/media\/press-releases\/crockett-condemns-trump-firing-chairman-joint-chiefs-staff\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">said in a statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Bigoted statements such as this divisively&mdash; and, without evidence&mdash;suggest that a servicemembers&rsquo; race, religion, sex, or gender identity erode military readiness. These suggestions could not be further from the truth,&rdquo; she added.<\/p>\n<p>Sen. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/Mark-Kelly\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">Mark Kelly<\/a> (D-AZ), who served as a Navy combat pilot and a NASA astronaut, said Trump purged &ldquo;decades of experience from the highest ranks of our military for no good reason.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;This is disrespectful to the service and sacrifice of everyone who&rsquo;s put their life on the line for our country,&rdquo; he wrote in a post <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/SenMarkKelly\/status\/1893128871022596521\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">on X<\/a>. &rdquo;The military must be above politics.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">General CQ Brown is a dedicated military officer, combat veteran and was a very effective Chaiman of the Joint Chiefs. Tonight, Trump is purging decades of experience from the highest ranks of our military for no good reason. This is disrespectful to the service and sacrifice of&hellip;<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Senator Mark Kelly (@SenMarkKelly) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SenMarkKelly\/status\/1893128871022596521?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">February 22, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/cdn-cgi\/scripts\/5c5dd728\/cloudflare-static\/email-decode.min.js\"><\/script><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>    <\/p>\n<p>The firings came after a group of six bipartisan House lawmakers with experience in the military <a href=\"https:\/\/crow.house.gov\/sites\/evo-subsites\/crow.house.gov\/files\/evo-media-document\/Generals%20Letter%202-21-25.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">wrote a letter<\/a> to Hegseth about his reported plans to dismiss top generals and flag officers on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;There are valid reasons to remove a general or flag officer, but there must be clear, transparent, and apolitical criteria and processes associated with any such dismissal,&rdquo; the lawmakers wrote.<\/p>\n<p>The letter was signed by Reps. Don Bacon (R-NE), Seth Moulton (D-MA), CHrissy Houlahan (D-OA), Jason Crow (D-CO), Mikie Sherill (D-NJ) and Jared Golden (D-ME), all members of the House Armed Services Committee.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><\/a><\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>They asked Hegseth to unveil the process by which the general and flag officers are being evaluated for dismissal, how the officers were nominated for review and which elements of an officer&rsquo;s written record will be reviewed.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee thanked Brown &ldquo;for his decades of honorable service to our nation&rdquo; and expressed confidence that &ldquo;Hegseth and President Trump will select a qualified and capable successor for the critical position of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> <script>!function(){var g=window;g.googletag=g.googletag||{},g.googletag.cmd=g.googletag.cmd||[],g.googletag.cmd.push(function(){g.googletag.pubads().setTargeting(\"has-featured-video\",\"true\")})}();<\/script><script>var _bp=_bp||[];_bp.push({\"div\":\"Brid_2016266\",\"obj\":{\"id\":\"27789\",\"width\":\"1280\",\"height\":\"720\",\"stickyDirection\":\"below\",\"video\":\"2016266\"}});<\/script><script defer src=\"https:\/\/services.brid.tv\/player\/build\/brid.min.js\"><\/script><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Democrats criticize Trump for politically motivated Pentagon firings<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2657,"featured_media":2405489,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/CQ-Brown-scaled-1024x681.webp","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[4505,5894,3634],"class_list":["post-2405488","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-military","tag-politics","tag-trump"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/CQ-Brown-scaled-1024x681.webp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2405488","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2657"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2405488"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2405488\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2405492,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2405488\/revisions\/2405492"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2405489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2405488"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2405488"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2405488"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}