Trump Willing To Give DeSantis The Pentagon In Return For A Senate Seat Appointment For Lara Trump

Hegseth Appears To Be Toast

Tuesday night both Marc Caputo at The Bulwark and, earlier, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump may be preparing to dump Hegseth overboard and replace him with DeSantis. Although Trump has plenty of sycophants in the Senate who would vote to confirm a tree stump if Trump nominated it, it looks like 6 senators are not ready to confirm Hegseth: Susan Collins (ME), Lisa Murkowsky (AK), Mitch McConnell (KY), Bill Cassidy (LA), Thom Tillis (NC) and Senator-elect John Curtis (UT). Without Sinema or Manchin among the Democrats, the GOP can only afford to lose 4 votes to end Hegseth’s hopes to run the Pentagon.

Caputo reported that DeSantis and Señor T have spoken personally and in depth about DeSantis replacing Hegseth. DeSantis wants to do it— although at some point Trump is likely to demand that DeSantis appoint Lara Trump to fill the rest of Marco Rubio’s Senate term in exchange for the appointment. “DeSantis, a Navy veteran, would face a far easier Senate confirmation than Hegseth, who has been dogged by salacious reports of drunkenness and sexual assault,” wrote Caputo. “While Hegseth’s attorney denies the allegations, criticism of his conduct has gained steam on the right in recent days. Newsmax host Greg Kelly on Monday night called on Hegseth to quit and commentator Ann Coulter criticized Hegseth for being a “sleazy serial adulterer.”

“I’m not sure what Pete is going to say, but right now he looks like a goner,” said a Trump adviser who spoke on condition of anonymity. “Trump talking to DeSantis while this is all going on is a sure sign that Trump doesn’t think Pete is gonna make it.”

…Earlier on Tuesday morning, Trump had expressed support for Hegseth.

“We’re with him 100 percent,” Trump said, according to that adviser.

But as Gaetz’s star-crossed nomination showed, Trump is with his nominees until he decides it’s not worth it. And he’s not willing to spend too much political capital, at least not yet, on nominations that appear to be lost causes.

What Trump likes about DeSantis, according to one of the insiders briefed on the president-elect’s thinking, is that the governor has an uncompromising, no-nonsense approach to conservative governance. Not only is DeSantis a leader in “anti-woke” policy that Trump wants replicated in the Pentagon, he believes the governor can help root out waste in the department’s notoriously profligate budget.

“He needs don’t-give-a-fuck honey badger to go in there and root out waste,” a DeSantis confidant said. “And the gov is the OG honey badger.”

But many top Trump advisers dislike DeSantis for running against the once-and-future president, and some have been frustrated behind the scenes by the governor’s unwillingness, so far, to pick Lara Trump as a replacement for Rubio.

DeSantis resented being told whom to appoint and was uncomfortable with making Lara Trump, a newly minted Floridian, a senator. “She hasn’t paid her dues in the state. If she wants to become a senator, she can run for it in two years,” a DeSantis adviser said.

Asked if a possible Defense Department post could change some of DeSantis’s thinking, the adviser added:

“Who knows what’s going to happen. This is Trump’s world. We’re all just living in it.”

Although Mar-a-lago isn’t coming right out and saying it, the reason Trump is ready to dump Hegseth is because he lied— lie of omission— about his chronic alcoholism and predatory sexual behavior. Trump doesn’t especiallycare about the underlying behavior, only that Hegseth didn’t warn the transition team about what was coming.

Alex Leary at The Journal reported that Trump’s team understands that Hegseth isn’t going to make it through the confirmation process. Trump has been talking about replacing him with DeSantis with random dinner guests at Mar-a-lago. But “Another potential defense secretary candidate who has been discussed by Trump allies, according to people familiar with the matter, is Elbridge Colby, a former Pentagon official and ally of Vice President-elect JD Vance. Trump is also considering Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) for the job, some of the people said.”

Wednesday morning, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan emphasized that “the number of people in Trump’s world who dislike and distrust DeSantis— and bitterly recall the campaign he ran against the president-elect— is vast. Those people are discussing other options, including whether Mike Waltz, the Florida congressman who Trump picked as his national security adviser, could slide into the job, expecting he would be confirmed fairly easily by the Senate… Trump has spent little if any personal capital with senators trying to push Hegseth through. And the incoming president’s advisers are mindful in private discussions that Republican senators are trying to be respectful of Trump while not approving of a nominee who concerns them.”

Trump hates all the scandalous press around Hegseth— especially the e-mail from his mother calling him an unfit misogynistic pig (although she’s trying to take it back).