Fox News top political analyst Brit Hume rebuked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth—previously a host on the network—for lashing out at reporter Jennifer Griffin during a contentious press conference Thursday.
Hegseth exploded at Griffin, Fox News’ chief national security correspondent, after she asked whether Iran had moved uranium from the Fordo nuclear facility ahead of U.S. strikes.
“Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst, the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says,” Hegseth, 46, told Griffin, 56, one of the Pentagon’s most respected reporters.
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Hume, who has been a Fox News analyst since 1996 after leaving ABC, later condemned Hegseth’s outburst, calling it “an attack she certainly, in my view, did not deserve.”
“I have then, have had and still have, the greatest regard for her,” he said on America’s Newsroom. “The attack on her was unfair.”
Griffin herself fired back at Hegseth, who was co-host on Fox & Friends Weekend before President Donald Trump picked him to serve in his Cabinet.
Wagging her finger at the secretary, she said, “I was the first to describe the B2 bombers, the refueling, the entire mission with great accuracy. So I take issue with that.”
Despite their shared history at the network, Hegseth has frequently targeted Griffin, whose reporting has at times cast him in a critical light.
In February, he labeled Griffin as a Democrat and a “Trump hater” after she reported on a letter from House Democrats to the defense secretary asking him to justify more than $130,000 in taxpayer-funded repairs for his government-provided house, including $49,000 for an “emergency” paint job.
A few weeks later, as Hegseth scrambled to contain the “Signalgate” fallout, Griffin alleged that Hegseth had texted “classified” information via the Signal group chat with other members of the Trump cabinet, putting forces involved in strikes on Houthi forces in Yemen “directly and immediately at risk.”
She said the texts went “beyond war plans” because they included the timing of the strikes, refuting Hegseth, who insisted that no “war plans” were sent.
Hegseth’s fury during Thursday’s early morning briefing wasn’t directed at Griffin alone. He unloaded on other members of the media for trying to “manipulate the public’s mind” and maintained that the strikes on Iran’s nuclear facility were successful—despite initial battle damage assessments suggesting they only set the country’s nuclear program back by three to six months.
He called upon the press to focus on stories about the supposed efficacy of the strikes rather than “cheering” against Trump, even addressing his former employer.
“How many stories have been written about how hard it is, I don’t know, to fly a plane for 36 hours? Has MSNBC done that story? Has Fox? Have we done the story?” he said.
