‘You’ve been the worst!’ Pete Hegseth browbeats former Fox News colleague for her reporting on Iran strikes

Pete Hegseth, the former Fox News host turned defense secretary, lambasted a former network colleague over her reporting on the US airstrikes on Iran, calling her “the worst” for how she’s “intentionally” misrepresented President Donald Trump.

During a fiery press conference Thursday morning that seemed intended for an audience of one, Hegseth devoted much of his energy lashing out at the “fake news” media for reporting on a preliminary intelligence assessment that suggested that “Operation Midnight Hammer” only set back Iran’s nuclear program a few months.

“Maybe there’ll be a little mention here or there, but because it was under President Trump’s leadership, because it was, because, because Americans are responding to him as commander in chief, the press corps doesn’t want to write about it, and that brings us to the topic of the moment, the highly successful strikes in Iran,” the Pentagon chief fumed.

Later Hegseth, whose pro-Trump sycophancy as a Fox & Friends co-host led to his appointment as Secretary of Defense, decided to tear into longtime Fox News chief national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin when she tried to ask about Iran preemptively moving its uranium resources ahead of the airstrikes.

“Do you have certainty that all the highly enriched uranium was inside the Fordow mountain, or some of it, because there were satellite photos that showed more than a dozen trucks there two days in advance,” she asked him. “Are you certain that none of that highly enriched uranium was moved?”

Rather than answer her question, Hegseth lobbed personal insults at his one-time co-worker.

“Of course, we‘re watching every single aspect,” he responded. “But, Jennifer, you‘ve been about the worst. The one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says. I’m familiar.”

Taken aback, Griffin – one of the most experienced and respected reporters at the Pentagon– noted that she “reported on the ventilation shafts on Saturday night” and “was the first to describe the B-2 bombers, the refueling, the entire mission with great accuracy.”

Hegseth, meanwhile, snarked that he appreciated her “acknowledging that this was the most successful mission based on operational security that this department has done since you’ve been here.”

The Independent has reached out to Fox News for comment.

Throughout his presentation, Hegseth also dismissed the assessment that was compiled by the Pentagon’s own Defense Intelligence Agency as a “low confidence report” while assailing the “biased” press corps for covering the “biased leaked” document. Instead, as he said to one reporter, the media should “wave an American flag” and “be proud of what we accomplished.”

While Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine repeatedly affirmed Trump’s assertion that Iran’s nuclear capabilities were “totally and completely obliterated,” the president commented in real time on his Truth Social media platform and repeated his call for reporters to be terminated.

“Rumor is that the Failing New York Times and Fake News CNN will be firing the reporters who made up the FAKE stories on the Iran Nuclear sites because they got it so wrong,” he posted on Truth Social at the start of the press conference. “Lets see what happens?”

A short while later, an Associated Press reporter followed up on Griffin’s question, prompting Hegseth to claim that he was “not aware” of any intelligence “that says things were not where they were supposed to be,” suggesting that the enriched uranium was still at Fordow during the bombing raid.

Preliminary assessments shared with European nations, however, indicated that the uranium was moved, and Iran’s stockpiles remain largely intact.

Following the defense secretary’s press conference, the hosts of Trump’s favorite morning show Fox & Friends did not immediately come to Griffin’s defense as they returned to air, instead cheering on Hegseth for his “emotional” performance while applauding him for attacking the press.

“He was furious that all the media is focusing on this preliminary report,” co-host Ainsley Earhardt noted. “He said that was leaked, that is the first thing we receive after a blast, after a mission, so we can determine if we need to go back in. That was leaked, and it is usually wrong.”

Eventually, the Fox & Friends crew brought on Griffin to talk about the presser – but never mentioned that Hegseth had browbeaten her. Co-host Brian Kilmeade did say, however, that he “really appreciated” her reporting on the Iranian crisis throughout the past week.

Hegseth’s broadsides against Griffin aren’t exactly unexpected, as she’s long been a favorite target of MAGA and the president himself – largely because she goes against the network orthodoxy of blindly backing Trump. During Trump’s first administration, for instance, he called for Fox News to fire her after she confirmed The Atlantic’s report that the president had disparaged veterans and didn’t want to honor deceased American soldiers.

Hegseth isn’t even the first former Fox Newser to take aim at Griffin over her reporting. Even before he was fired by the network, Tucker Carlson had taken swipes at Griffin during the early days of Russia’s war against Ukraine, calling her a “so-called reporter” and “flack” for the Pentagon.

In recent days, as Carlson has been overtly criticizing his former employer over its hawkish stance on Iran, he’s continued to blast Griffin – whom he called a “shill” for the “deepest of the deep states” and a “parody” this week.

“The crazy thing is Jen Griffin is a liar, but also very liberal, a true Trump hater, to the point where I complained about her and I really tried not to complain about other people at Fox when I worked there,” former Fox & Friends co-host Clayton Morris told Carlson.

Meanwhile, Griffin only invoked more MAGA anger this month after she publicly criticized the administration’s overzealous ICE raids, noting that the arrest of a former interpreter for the U.S. Army after he attended his asylum hearing “should anger every American” as he’d helped American troops and hadn’t “broken a single law.”

And earlier this week, she refuted Trump’s claims that an agreement is not needed with Iran to assure they won’t pursue a nuclear bomb following the airstrikes.

“Every US and Israeli expert who has studied the Iranian nuclear program tells me that without an agreement and inspectors on the ground the Iranian regime, which while definitely hurt survived the humiliating military strikes on its key nuclear sites and ballistic missile infrastructure, will return to pursuing nuclear enrichment with the aim of eventually having a nuclear weapon,” Griffin reported.

“It may take some time but you can’t bomb the knowledge. There is no way to bomb Iran’s nuclear ambitions.”