Pete Hegseth, the host of the weekend edition of “Fox & Friends,” is President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for U.S. secretary of defense, one of the most powerful positions not only in the country but also in the world. Critics, and even some Republican U.S. senators, are shocked by the choice, with some pointing out what they see as his choice. lack of qualifications and its apparent links to far-right Christian nationalism are causes for concern.

The London-based non-profit organization, Action against gun violence (AOAV), issued a statement on Hegseth’s “associations with Christian nationalist movements” and warned of his “links to extremist Christian theologies…(which) raised alarms about the direction the potential Trump administration.

The current US Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, is a retired four-star general in the US Army. He served as commander of United States Central Command (CENTCOM), vice chief of staff of the Army, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, and director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He is a decorated soldier, awarded for his bravery and distinguished service. Austin graduated from West Point in 1975 and served in the United States Armed Forces until his retirement in 2016.

Hegseth has served in the Minnesota Army National Guard since 2003. He holds the rank of major, has received several awards and has served in Guantanamo Bay, Iraq and Afghanistan.

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A day before Joe Biden is sworn in as the 46th US president, The associated press reported: “Twelve members of the US National Guard were removed from the mission to secure the inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden after being examined by the FBI, including two who made extremist statements in messages or texts on the event, Pentagon officials said. »

“Two other U.S. officials told The Associated Press that all 12 had ties to right-wing militias or had posted extremist views online,” the report noted. “Officials told the AP they were all expelled due to ‘security responsibilities’.”

Jim LaPorta, an award-winning journalist who shared the byline on the AP story, is now a verification producer at CBS News Confirmed. He served two tours in Afghanistan and often writes about the U.S. military and veterans.

Last week, well before the SecDef nomination, LaPorta posted a video of Hegseth on the social media site X and wrote: “Interesting. A few years ago, I got a scoop that the Pentagon later confirmed that twelve members of the US National Guard had been removed from the mission to secure the inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden, after verification. It turns out one of them was @PeteHegseth.

In the video, Hegseth at least partially confirms why he was removed from Biden’s inauguration.

Interesting. A few years ago, I got a scoop that the Pentagon later confirmed that twelve members of the US National Guard had been removed from the mission to secure the inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden, after verification. It turns out one of them was @PeteHegseth pic.twitter.com/QcQQmtUJJ1

– Jim LaPorta (@JimLaPorta) November 7, 2024

“I was deemed an extremist because of a tattoo by my National Guard unit in Washington, D.C. And my orders were revoked to monitor Biden’s inauguration,” Hegseth said in the video. “The Jerusalem Cross tattoo, which is just a Christian symbol… got me uninvited.”

Religious scholar Matthew D. Taylor, a senior fellow at the Institute for Islamic, Christian and Jewish Studies, says Hegseth’s tattoo is not just a Christian symbol.

“Hegseth is a prominent Fox News personality and veterans advocate, but he also has strong ties to the Christian far right,” Taylor wrote at the start of a lengthy thread, posting a photo of Hegseth with his tattoos on display – and he notes that there are not one but two Christian tattoos.

Yesterday, Trump announced that he was nominating Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense.

Hegseth is a prominent Fox News personality and veterans advocate, but he also has close ties to the Christian far right that I have yet to see fully exposed.

Here is a discussion thread with the receipts… 1/ pic.twitter.com/FdnhMZx4nx

– Matthew D. Taylor (@TaylorMatthewD) November 13, 2024

“Hegseth has 2 crusader tattoos: a Jerusalem cross, symbol of the crusader kingdom of Jerusalem on his chest”, which he showed in the video, “& ‘Deus Vult’, the theological cri de coeur of the crusaders (“God wants it”). ) on his bicep. “Deus Vult” means that God ordered the violence of the Crusaders,” Taylor writing.

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He also emphasizes a Newsweek article focusing on Hegseth’s withdrawal from Biden’s inauguration. He also looks at his cross tattoo.

“In recent years, some right-wing nationalist groups have adopted Crusader imagery, including depictions of the Knights Templar and the Crusader slogan Deus vult, which is Latin for ‘God wills it’.”

HAS The rampartAnnika Brockschmidt and Thomas Lecaque report Thursday: “Donald Trump’s potential Defense Secretary has not been frank about the violent symbolism of his ink.”

They explain that there are numerous tattoos, which they say constitute “a veritable checklist of today’s Christian nationalist folklore.”

Brockschmidt and Lecaque write from experience. Biography of Brockschmidt reads: “Trained journalist, author, and historian writing about reactionary right-wing movements in the United States and Europe, with an emphasis on the religious right and white Christian nationalism.” ” And at Lecaque says he is an “associate professor of history at Grand View University, studying religious violence and apocalypticism.”

“Hegseth insinuates that he was discriminated against because of this ‘religious’ image on his body,” they write. “But the symbol is not only religious: it has always had a political valence. The Jerusalem Cross was used as the emblem of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from the late 13th century. You may have seen him in Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven (2005). It has made its way into a variety of contemporary far-right Templar myths. All this is not mentioned by Hegseth.

“And this is far from being the only ideologically charged tattoo on Trump’s SecDef candidate,” they add. “Hegseth’s right arm is covered from top to bottom, and most of the images are taken from Revolution-era propaganda, primarily associated today with the “patriot” rhetoric of militia movements and QAnon. Three of them are clearly visible in the cover photo of one of his books, American Crusade: (1) the year 1775 in Roman numerals, (2) “We the People” in stylized colonial script, and ( 3) an American flag. with a modified M-4 superimposed on the lower bars.

“He also wears Ben Franklin’s famous “Join or Die” cartoon – the cutout snake representing the plight of the ununified colonies – on the underside of his forearm. On his shoulder he wears the insignia of the 187th Infantry Regiment in which he served; his elbow is decorated with a circle of stars and the crook of his arm presents a pair of crossed muskets.

They add that Hegseth also has “tattoos that have made the work of Crusade historians once again depressingly relevant to contemporary politics: a sword embedded in a cross on Hegseth’s forehead.” inner forearm– this represents Matthew 10:34, the verse in which Christ says: “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword” – and, most disturbing of all, a Gothic inscription on his bicep: ‘Deus Vult.’

They offer a more in-depth explanation of the “Deus Vultures” tattoo.

“‘Deus Vult’ has never been interpreted as a call to spiritual warfare, reflection and prayer. This has always been understood as a call to violent action, to bloodshed. This interpretation remains consistent in its widespread adoption by the Christian community. far RIGHT around THE worldincluding by some who marched on the Capitol on January 6, and A who carried out shocking white supremacist violence against Muslims in New Zealand.

They say Hegseth’s tattoos provide “a veritable checklist of today’s Christian nationalists.” folklore. Among those who advocate the union of Church and State, gun tattoos like Hegseth’s amounts to a kind of spiritual kitsch, a younger, more radical generation’s version of putting up a framed print of Albrecht Dürer’s work study of praying hands on the dining room wall. Weapon iconography is omnipresent: Hegseth used his Instagram profile to advertise silent, ammunitionAnd pomegranate shaped soaps.”

Watch the video above or on this link.

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