STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Critics of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth missed an opportunity to put the House of Representatives on the record.
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
A lone Republican lawmaker, Thomas Massie, sponsored a resolution to impeach Hegseth over the Iran war and other issues. Every other Republican present voted to set the matter aside, and that was just enough in a House that Republicans control for a few more weeks.
INSKEEP: NPR Congress reporter Eric McDaniel was at the Capitol and is now here in Studio 31. Eric, thanks for coming by.
ERIC MCDANIEL, BYLINE: Of course.
INSKEEP: What exactly was that vote yesterday?
MCDANIEL: Well, they referred it to committee, right? It was basically a parliamentary maneuver to avoid taking up the impeachment charges and voting on them. Republicans had a simple majority of folks who were actually in attendance at the vote last night, and that was enough to quash it, right? It was the Congress version of making the bill wait on, like, an endless customer support hold.
INSKEEP: Or I'm thinking (laughter) - I'm thinking about that old "Schoolhouse Rock!" thing.
MCDANIEL: Yeah, yeah. Right.
INSKEEP: I'm just a bill. Got stuck in committee. Republicans stood in Trump's corner here - in Hegseth's corner - even after a big election loss that had a lot to do with the war in Iran.
MCDANIEL: You know, it's a really good point, and it's something I raised beforehand with a Republican lawmaker. On Monday afternoon, well before the vote, actually, I hopped on the phone with Warren Davidson. He's a Republican congressman from Ohio. And he told me he thinks this war, this conflict, is unconstitutional because it was never authorized by Congress, who, of course, have the power to regulate military conflict. But he doesn't blame Hegseth for that.
WARREN DAVIDSON: Trying to scapegoat Pete Hegseth is just a kind of status quo politics in Washington is, oh, we got to find somebody who wasn't on the ballot to take the heat for the way that the election turned out.
MCDANIEL: He argues, basically, if Congress has a problem with the war, use the power of the purse and refuse to fund it. He also would like to see the administration articulate a plan.
INSKEEP: What about the other charges here involving killing people who'd been on boats in the Caribbean?
MCDANIEL: Yeah. You're talking about these boat bombings the administration claims disrupt drug trafficking. There was also a charge for suppressing free speech after the Pentagon tried to punish Mark Kelly - he's a Democratic senator from Arizona - for a video telling service members they are allowed and, in fact, must refuse illegal orders. So a lot of different stuff in there.
Hegseth ultimately put out a video last week calling the whole effort a sham. He said, it didn't work against President Trump, and it won't work with me. Trump also helped to whip votes on this. Here's what the White House said in a statement. Quote "the administration strongly opposes this impeachment resolution against Secretary Hegseth - a rogue, politically motivated effort to undermine our warfighters, our nation's Constitution and our national security."
INSKEEP: Somebody else seems to have helped Hegseth here. Do I understand this correctly? Some Republicans were absent. Democrats actually had enough people physically in Washington, maybe, or at least, you know, on the rolls to pass this, but some were not on the floor for the vote.
MCDANIEL: Yeah. I mean, definitely on the rolls, this was always going to be a game of attendance, like we talked about earlier this week...
INSKEEP: Yeah.
MCDANIEL: ...Once Republicans got their clocks cleaned in the midterms, it was going to be a game to see if they could get themselves back in town. And ultimately, they beat Democrats on attendance performance, as we saw in the vote. Hakeem Jeffries obviously supported this impeachment against Hegseth, so we'll see what happens now.
INSKEEP: Although this seems like a lack of seriousness to not show up. What happens now?
MCDANIEL: So, next, Steve, these charges aren't going anywhere, but this was always going to face a steep climb. But it was always kind of a messaging effort, too, right? And there are lots of those still to come. The administration asked for an unprecedented $1.5 trillion in defense money. There's also a separate December 11 government funding deadline. There could be new war powers votes, some of which have already attracted - before the midterm elections - Republican support.
So still lots of points of leverage left coming for Iran war opponents to extract concessions from the administration, anything from Hegseth's exit to winding down the conflict or, I guess, any number of other things. But what happens next, it isn't going to happen by impeaching or removing the Secretary of Defense. Though that could change when the new Congress is sworn in under Democratic control in January.
INSKEEP: NPR's Eric McDaniel. Thanks so much.
MCDANIEL: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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