Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made false claims under oath during recent congressional hearings, according to a review by CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale.
Hegseth recently testified before both the Senate Armed Services Committee and the House Armed Services Committee, where discussions largely focused on the Pentagon’s proposed 2027 budget, internal staffing changes and the ongoing war in Iran.
During a House hearing, Rep. Jill Tokuda (D-HI) questioned Hegseth about whether he would follow a hypothetical order from President Donald Trump to deploy troops to polling sites during midterm elections — an action that could violate federal law without specific justification.
In response, Hegseth said Trump would not issue unlawful orders and instead claimed that former President Joe Biden had previously done so.
Dale, however, reported that the assertion was inaccurate. His report stated, “All of the National Guard activations connected to the 2024 election were ordered by state governors, not by Biden. And all 11 of the states that responded to CNN’s requests for information last week said that none of their troops were deployed to polling locations.”
“Rather, the states said their Guard personnel worked behind the scenes at other locations – helping with election cybersecurity or serving as internal liaisons – or that their state Guard was not actually activated for the election after all,” he added.
State officials echoed those findings. “We help in a cybersecurity capacity...
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