CNN senior data reporter Harry Enten said Wednesday that it would be almost miraculous for Pete Hegseth to be confirmed as the next secretary of defense.
President-elect Donald Trump announced on Nov. 12 that Hegseth would be his nominee to lead the Defense Department, with the veteran and former Fox News host subsequently facing scrutiny for his alleged mistreatment of women. Enten, on “CNN News Central,” explained that the betting odds suggest Hegseth is unlikely to be confirmed as his chances are now lower than those of Republican Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz when he withdrew from consideration to be Trump’s nominee for attorney general.
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“Oh my. Chance that Pete Hegseth is confirmed as the defense secretary. You look, three weeks ago … He had an 83% chance, per the betting markets, tumbling down, a drop of more than 70 percentage points,” Enten said. “Holy toledo, 12% now. I mean, Matt Gaetz, when he steps aside, still had more than a 30% chance of becoming the next attorney general. This is just at 12%.”
“This is the type of odds when you really think that it would take a minor miracle, a mini Hail Mary to, in fact, be confirmed by the United States Senate. The bottom line is this: The bettors very down on Pete Hegseth,” he continued. “You could do it in any language you want to do it, you could do ‘oy, no bueno, no good,’ this 12%. Could it happen? Yeah, maybe. But chances are this dude is not going to get confirmed as the next defense secretary.”
Hegseth’s mother Penelope Hegseth emailed her son on April 30, 2018, while he was going through a divorce, to condemn his alleged mistreatment and belittling of women “for his own power and ego,” The New York Times first reported. However, she told “Fox & Friends” host Steve Doocy Wednesday that she wrote the email “in haste,” saying that she wants to “discredit” the media for allegedly threatening her before publishing the email.
“I am here to tell the truth, to tell the truth to the American people and tell the truth to the senators on [Capitol Hill], especially our female senators,” Hegseth’s mother said. “I really hope that you will not listen to the media and that you will listen to Pete … Let’s go back 7 years, which, if we all went back 7 years, we would see that we are not the people that we are today.”
“But they were going through, Pete and his wife at the time, were going through a very difficult divorce. It was a very emotional time, and I’m sure many of you across the country understand how difficult divorce is on a family,” she continued. “There’s emotions, we say things, and I wrote that in haste, I wrote that with deep emotions, I wrote that as a parent.”
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