On Nov. 4, the vice president bluntly blamed the war for the GOP’s massive loss in the midterm elections, saying, “Everyone knows why we lost. And any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there.”
But on Tuesday, after it was apparent that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth could soon be impeached, in large part due to his handling of the conflict, Vance decided to come to his defense.
Naturally, he took to X, writing: “Has Pete Hegseth committed impeachable crimes? The question is absurd, and the answer is: obviously not.”
Vance then argued that “like so much of Congress, impeachment has become a ridiculous show that stands in for actual policymaking.”
“Congress has so many tools for registering its policy disagreements,” he continued. “Rather than use them, they’re going to try to impeach Pete Hegseth. They did the same to Donald Trump. Legislation is hard. Impeachments are easy (and ultimately, inconsequential).”
Vance claimed Hegseth is being targeted not for his handling of the war but because legislators don’t like that he is “repositioning forces away from Europe/Ukraine and reorganizing the general officer corps.”
“This isn’t about Iran,” he insisted. “This is about the fact that Pete took on the bureaucracy at the Pentagon.”
The defense secretary faces eight articles of impeachment, including illegally waging war without congressional authorization and abusing his powers as Pentagon chief.
Hegseth might appreciate Vance’s defense, but many critics on social media felt he was purposely avoiding some very obvious points.