There have been so many instances where this man has denied promotions to very high ranking and very accomplished women and men of color. He seems to be on a crusade to rid the Armed Forces of high-ranking women and black officers in particular. “Hegseth, in my opinion, is the kind of white guy who has a small personality but wants to seem big, strong, and tough,” Marks said. “People like that can be very dangerous. That’s evident in some of the actions they’ve taken. I never thought that I would see the National Guard being deployed outside of a national disaster or emergency.” https://share.google/m1kW0pruGRwAr1bUe Hegseth recently shifted his views on women serving in combat. In November, he said he opposed women in combat, and used gender stereotypes to make his case. He stated, “I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles. It hasn’t made us more effective. Hasn’t made us more lethal. Has made fighting more complicated.” But after meeting with several women senators in December, he said “we support all women in our military today, . . . combat included.” https://www.aclu.org/news/civil-liberties/who-is-pete-hegseth Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is blocking the promotion of four Army officers to be one-star generals, a highly unusual move that has prompted some senior military officials to question whether the officers are being singled out because of their race or gender. Two of the officers targeted by Mr. Hegseth are Black and two are women on a promotion list that consists of about three dozen officers, most of whom are white men, senior military officials said. Mr. Hegseth had been pressing senior Army leaders, including Army Secretary Daniel P. Driscoll, for months to remove the officers’ names, military officials said. But Mr. Driscoll, citing the officers’ decades-long records of exemplary service, had repeatedly refused. Earlier this month, Mr. Hegseth broke the logjam by unilaterally striking the officers’ names from the list, though it is not clear he has the legal authority to do so. The list is currently being reviewed by the White House, which is expected to send it to the Senate for final approval. The frustrations with Mr. Hegseth’s approach came to a boil last summer during a heated exchange between Ricky Buria, Mr. Hegseth’s chief of staff, and Mr. Driscoll about a separate promotion. Mr. Buria told Mr. Driscoll that President Trump would not want to stand next to a Black female officer at military events, the officials said. Today, about 43 percent of the 1.3 million troops on active duty are people of color. But those leading the military are overwhelmingly white and male. Mr. Austin pressed promotion boards to look deeper into the ranks to ensure qualified women and minorities were considered for senior positions. Senior military officials said they could not recall any previous instance of a defense secretary seeking to remove individual officers from a military board’s list. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/27/us/hegseth-promotion-list.html?smid=nytcore-android-share
