The public deserves to know when the Department of Defense starts acting like a rogue intelligence agency. And yet, that’s exactly what appears to have happened under Pete Hegseth’s short, scandal-riddled tenure as Trump’s hand-picked Secretary of Defense. The latest bombshell? An alleged illegal NSA wiretap ordered without a warrant to track down leakers inside the Pentagon. If true, it’s not just unethical—it’s unconstitutional.
Let’s lay out the facts with the precision the administration has tried so hard to avoid.
In the wake of the “Signalgate” leak—where screenshots of classified military strategy were passed around a private Signal chat like gossip in a middle school hallway—Hegseth’s team zeroed in on three aides: Dan Caldwell, Colin Carroll, and Darin Selnick. All were fired.
Then came the explosive claim: Hegseth’s lawyer, Tim Parlatore, told a reporter the firings were based on an NSA wiretap. No warrant. No court oversight. Just an off-the-books spy operation on American citizens, conducted under the guise of national security. When the legal alarm bells started ringing, Parlatore backpedaled. Suddenly, the wiretap never existed. Or maybe it did. Or maybe someone else misunderstood. The story shifted more than Trump’s stance on NATO.
That’s when the White House, already skittish from Hegseth’s prior antics, started pulling the plug. Vice President JD Vance reportedly “lost confidence.” The investigation was reassigned to Deputy Defense Secretary Stephen Feinberg, a mercenary billionaire with no formal intelligence background. That’s not accountability—it’s containment.
This wasn’t just an internal leak probe gone wrong. It was an attempt to consolidate power through surveillance, scapegoating, and deception. And the media cycle has moved on too quickly, letting the White House off the hook for allowing it to happen in the first place.
Consider the context. Hegseth was already mired in ethical quicksand—disregard for military protocol, politicization of the chain of command, and a fundamental disdain for oversight. This wiretap episode is not a deviation from the norm. It’s a confirmation of the pattern.
And if history has taught us anything, it’s that when leaders spy on subordinates under the flag of patriotism, it’s usually not patriotism—it’s panic.
The comparisons to Watergate aren’t hyperbole. They’re a warning. The only difference is that this time, the machinery of accountability may already be too compromised to respond.
We’re watching a Pentagon under Trump morph from a defense department into a domestic intelligence tool—loyal not to the Constitution, but to the personality cult in charge.
And if you think this scandal is over because the headlines have quieted, ask yourself: how many more “legal misunderstandings” are hiding behind executive privilege?
Hegseth may be on the ropes, but the system that enabled him still stands.
