Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s wife was paid by a consulting firm representing a weapons manufacturer that works with the Department of Defense, a new report has revealed.
Jennifer Hegseth, an unofficial Pentagon adviser to her husband, indicated on a disclosure form that Watchtower Strategy, an influential Trump-aligned public affairs firm that counts defense contractor Lockheed Martin among its clients, paid her for consulting, Politico reports.
Jennifer, a former Fox News producer, has already been exposed for embedding herself in daily DOD operations, raising questions about a potential conflict of interest within the Pentagon.
During the fiscal year Jennifer was paid by Watchtower Strategy, the U.S. government paid premier client Lockheed Martin over $66 billion, according to public records.
Chief Department of Defense Spokesperson Sean Parnell said in an emailed statement to Daily Beast that the department works to “ensure senior leaders are completely screened from matters involving former employers or private interests.”
“Secretary Hegseth and his wife are in full compliance with all ethics laws and regulations, and their sole focus is serving our warfighters, President Trump, and the American people. Any insinuations or claims otherwise are ridiculous slander,” Parnell wrote.
Parnell, however, did not make clear whether the Pentagon has screened Jennifer for a security clearance.
Watchtower Strategy did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson told Politico, “It should be no surprise that a public affairs firm would want to work with one of the biggest former star producers at Fox News, the nation’s preeminent conservative news outlet.”
Jennifer is the daughter of a former Lockheed Martin executive who died in 2009. In late 2024, she rushed to ingratiate herself as a Defense Department spouse by attending closed-door meetings with Republican senators before his confirmation hearing and sitting in on interviews for potential Hegseth underlings, according to a report from The New York Times.
Some senior officials and politicians interviewed by the Times said her proximity to sensitive defense conversations was “not normal.”
But the line between Jennifer’s position as a wife and a political actor has long been blurred. During a podcast with Katie Miller late last year, Jennifer said that after learning Hegseth would be the new defense secretary, “We were ready to serve in any capacity.”
