CHRIS CRUCIAL: Is Pete Hegseth a goner? ❌

PLUS: Another candidate in the DNC race!

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1. Wither Pete?

In the last 72 hours or so, two journalism bombs have been dropped on Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s pick to be the next Secretary of Defense.

The New York Times went first — getting its hands on an email Hegseth’s mom(!) sent him in 2018. Here’s part of it:

On behalf of all the women (and I know it’s many) you have abused in some way, I say … get some help and take an honest look at yourself.

I have no respect for any man that belittles, lies, cheats, sleeps around and uses women for his own power and ego. You are that man (and have been for years) and as your mother, it pains me and embarrasses me to say that, but it is the sad, sad truth.

OOMPH.

Hegseth’s mother, it’s worth noting, told the Times that she sent a follow-up email apologizing to him — explaining she had sent the missive “in anger, with emotion.” Uh, yeah.

Then on Monday the New Yorker’s Jane Mayer published a piece on Hegseth that included these lines:

A trail of documents, corroborated by the accounts of former colleagues, indicates that Hegseth was forced to step down by both of the two nonprofit advocacy groups that he ran—Veterans for Freedom and Concerned Veterans for America—in the face of serious allegations of financial mismanagement, sexual impropriety, and personal misconduct.

A previously undisclosed whistle-blower report on Hegseth’s tenure as the president of Concerned Veterans for America, from 2013 until 2016, describes him as being repeatedly intoxicated while acting in his official capacity—to the point of needing to be carried out of the organization’s events. The detailed seven-page report—which was compiled by multiple former C.V.A. employees and sent to the organization’s senior management in February, 2015—states that, at one point, Hegseth had to be restrained while drunk from joining the dancers on the stage of a Louisiana strip club, where he had brought his team. The report also says that Hegseth, who was married at the time, and other members of his management team sexually pursued the organization’s female staffers, whom they divided into two groups—the “party girls” and the “not party girls.” In addition, the report asserts that, under Hegseth’s leadership, the organization became a hostile workplace that ignored serious accusations of impropriety, including an allegation made by a female employee that another employee on Hegseth’s staff had attempted to sexually assault her at the Louisiana strip club. In a separate letter of complaint, which was sent to the organization in late 2015, a different former employee described Hegseth being at a bar in the early-morning hours of May 29, 2015, while on an official tour through Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, drunkenly chanting “Kill All Muslims! Kill All Muslims!”

Er….

The one-two punch appeared to further jeopardize Hegseth’s already-shaky chances of being confirmed, at least in the eyes of political betting markets. Check out this chart via Kalshi, one of the biggest political gambling sites:

That makes Hegseth the Cabinet nominee with the worst current chances of getting confirmed — dropping far below the 55% chance that Tulsi Gabbard has of becoming the next Director of National Intelligence.

Hegseth was on Capitol Hill on Monday. Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, one of Trump’s most loyal backers in the chamber, told reporters that Hegseth will huddle with more than a dozen GOP Senators later tonight.

“He’s going to have to answer a lot of questions,” Tuberville said. “Not just to y'all. But to people that are going, either possibly give him a confirmation vote or not give him a confirmation vote.”

Remember the math in the Senate: Hegseth — or any Trump nominee — can lose three Republican Senators’ votes and still be confirmed. (Vice President JD Vance would be the tie-breaker vote in such a situation.)

That’s a relatively narrow path for Hegseth to navigate — sort of like firing two torpedoes into the reactor core of the Death Star….

I mean, it’s possible! But, it’s not likely!

How will we know if Hegseth will make it? I’d closely monitor the public comments of a handful of Republican Senators including but not limited to: Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Kevin Cramer of North Dakota and Todd Young of Indiana.

Hegseth doesn’t need to convince the public that these allegations are either a) false or b) don’t affect his ability to lead the Defense Department. He just has to convince 50 GOP Senators of that fact.

Of course, those senators are politicians. And, like all politicians, they are influenced by public sentiment, which seems to be turning against Hegseth at the noment.

2. The DNC race takes (more) shape

Ben Wikler

And then there were four.

On Sunday, Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Ben Wikler made it official: He is running to be the next chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

“My platform in this race is unite, fight, win,” Wikler told the New York Times. “Uniting starts not with recriminations but with reckoning and with curiosity and data. And then you use all that to inform the way that you fight the next battle.”

Wikler has been seen as a rising star within the national party for several years now. While Donald Trump won Wisconsin at the presidential level last month, Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin narrowly secured another term and Democrats did well downballot as well.

Wikler is calling for a 50-state strategy aimed at building real campaign infrastructures for the party in every single state — even those not considered friendly to his side. In that, he is echoing the approach taken by Howard Dean, a former DNC Chair himself.

Wikler is the fourth candidate to enter the race — joining former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, Minnesota state party chairman Ken Martin and New York state Sen. James Koufis.

The other big name yet to make a decision on the contest is former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who is currently the Ambassador to Japan.

What’s interesting is that while Martin is one of the least well-known candidates to a national audience, he is widely seen as the frontrunner to win the chairmanship due to his strong connections to the 448 voting members of the DNC.

Here’s Politico on that:

In a measure of outreach even his competitors have acknowledged in recent days, Ken Martin, head of Minnesota’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, said he has locked down nearly half of the needed endorsements to win the contest. The race is widely perceived as a battle over the future of the party, which saw swaths of its coalition flock to President-elect Donald Trump.

Martin’s early efforts may ultimately be put to the test by other, bigger-name potential candidates who have not yet entered the race, like Rahm Emanuel or Sherrod Brown. But his initial lead also seems to reflect the diminished role of the DNC in the post-Obama era, and especially after losing the White House in November. If he wins, the party won’t be electing him as a force of personality, but as a safe pair of hands for the nuts-and-bolts operation on South Capitol Street.

It also may reflect the fact that some DNC members are looking to avoid a proxy war between progressives and establishment Democrats like the one that emerged during the party leadership race in 2017 after leaked emails revealed DNC officials criticized Bernie Sanders’ challenge to Hillary Clinton.

It remains to be seen if the names with more star power — Wikler and Emanuel in particular — are able to peel away previous commitments from Martin.

The DNC Chair race is set for February 1 during the organization’s winter meeting.

3. “Franksgiving”

I know Thanksgiving is behind us. The scale tells the story — for me at least.

But, before we get too far removed from the holiday, I wanted to share a video I posted on the day itself — detailing the time in 1939 that President Franklin D. Roosevelt changed the day the country celebrated Thanksgiving.

It was an absolute political nightmare for him — and a story you need to know. Check it out! And make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel where I am making daily videos!

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

“Of course I support the pardon of my son.” — First Lady Jill Biden, today

ONE GOOD CHART

How did swing voters get their news in the 2024 election? Predominantly from social media, according to this Navigator Research poll.

SONG OF THE DAY

There are a SLEW of “best albums of 2024” lists out today. There’s NPR. And Stereogum. And the New Yorker. I am still working on my own list but I can GUARANTEE you that this Hurray For The Riff Raff album is on there. This is “Buffalo” from that record.

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