WASHINGTON — The House on Tuesday voted 211-204 to send Rep. Thomas Massie’s resolution to impeach Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to the Judiciary Committee, hours after Hegseth used his first Pentagon press conference in six months to defend every operation the resolution cites as lawful, ordered by the president and reported to Congress.
The motion to refer H. Res. 1655 passed at 6:02 p.m. with 210 Republicans and one independent voting yes, according to the House clerk’s roll call. All 203 Democrats who voted opposed it, joined by Massie, the only Republican to vote no. Eighteen members did not vote.
“What one disgruntled and defeated Congressman is attempting is not oversight and it’s not accountability,” Hegseth said at the Pentagon on Tuesday morning, according to remarks the White House circulated. “As for the articles themselves — Iran, the cartels, Maduro, Yemen — every one was a lawful operation ordered by the Commander-in-Chief, then ordered by myself, notified to Congress, and executed by American warriors who did their jobs.”
Hegseth called the charges “policy disagreements — not high crimes, not misdemeanors, not treason, not bribery,” and said the proper remedy was “legislation,” “debate” and “the next Presidential election.” He added: “I stand behind every one of these operations. I was proud to execute them — and I would do it again tomorrow.”
The referral leaves the resolution with the Judiciary Committee, which can take it up but is not required to, Breaking Defense reported. NPR reported that the vote virtually guarantees the measure will not be taken up before the current Congress ends on Jan. 3. Reviving it in the next Congress, when Democrats will hold the House majority, would require a new resolution.
What the resolution charged
Massie, a Kentucky Republican who lost his primary this year and leaves office in January, introduced the 34-page resolution on Monday. Its eight articles, as summarized by Breaking Defense, accuse Hegseth of violating the War Powers Resolution of 1973 in three ways related to the war with Iran; of violating laws meant to limit civilian casualties, citing a U.S. strike on an Iranian elementary school; of retaliating against Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., over a video in which Kelly told service members of their duty to refuse unlawful orders; of the seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro; of conducting an unlawful war in Yemen; and of extrajudicial killings in the strikes on suspected drug boats in the Caribbean and Pacific.
Massie described Tuesday’s floor vote on social media as a “procedural motion to kill the resolution,” Breaking Defense reported.
The administration’s case
Hegseth argued that no secretary of war or defense has been impeached for carrying out lawful military operations, citing operations “under Reagan in Lebanon; … under Clinton in Kosovo; … under Obama in Iraq and Syria; … under Biden in Iraq and Syria.” He said the resolution “tells our enemies — Iran, the cartels, every adversary watching — that the United States will actually punish its own warriors and its own civilian leadership for successfully executing lawful military operations.”
He also pointed to results. “In Operation Epic Fury, by every measure, we achieved a historic military victory,” he said, adding, “We control the Strait of Hormuz.” Defense News reported that he said Iran’s navy and more than 80% of its nuclear industrial base had been destroyed, and that the briefing lasted less than 25 minutes with few questions taken. The Pentagon posted video of the press conference.
President Trump backed him on Tuesday, writing that Hegseth “gets an ‘A’ PLUS, PLUS, PLUS for his defense,” according to the White House. Vice President JD Vance said the question of whether Hegseth committed impeachable crimes “is absurd and the answer is: obviously not,” and argued that Congress has other tools to register policy disagreements. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., called the effort “a political gambit for attention” and said impeaching a war secretary during an international conflict “sends a terrible message to our enemies and our allies.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, asked about the articles at a news conference in Paris after a Group of Seven meeting, said the president “has a right to defend this country and to address imminent threats,” and that Hegseth carried out the commander in chief’s orders “quite effectively on all those fronts.”
Other Republicans also spoke against impeachment before the vote. Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., said she would not vote to impeach because “the Iran war is through no fault of his own,” according to the White House compilation.
The history
The House has impeached two Cabinet secretaries: Secretary of War William Belknap in 1876 and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in 2024. Neither was convicted by the Senate, Breaking Defense noted. Hegseth’s statutory title remains secretary of defense; the administration uses the secondary title secretary of war.
Tuesday’s vote came the day before Veterans Day and two days after Hegseth asked Congress for at least $350 billion in defense funding through budget reconciliation.
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