Trump to attend gathering of top generals, upending last-minute plans
Hundreds of top military officers and staff have been summoned to Virginia on short notice for a speech by Pete Hegseth. Trump decided this weekend to attend the meeting, adding new security concerns.
President Donald Trump has decided he’s going to the last-minute global gathering of the nation’s top generals in Quantico, Virginia, that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered last week.
Trump’s appearance not only upstages Hegseth’s plans but adds new security concerns to the massive and nearly unprecedented military event.
“We have confirmation from the White House that POTUS is now attending the speech on Tuesday,” according to a planning document sent Saturday that was viewed by The Washington Post.
Notice went out to offices around the Pentagon that the decision will “significantly change the security posture” of the speech, set for Tuesday morning.
The addition of the president at Quantico will now put the Secret Service in charge of securing the event. Hundreds of the military’s top commanding generals and admirals, ranked one-star and above, along with their senior enlisted leaders were ordered to attend by Hegseth last week. The orders provided no reason for the event and initially raised concern among attendees and military officials that he was gathering the group to inform them of mass firings or demotions.
Last week, The Post first reported that Hegseth was ordering all of the generals in command positions to Quantico to hear him speak for less than an hour about military standards and his vision for a “warrior ethos,” but the now expanded visit from the president could change that schedule — and add a more politicized tenor to the gathering.
“It’s the mother of all photo ops,” said Eugene R. Fidell, a military law expert at Yale Law School. The potential for the event to be politicized, and add to the politicization of the military, “is tremendously concerning and should be tremendously concerning to the American people.”
It is estimated that the cost of flying, lodging and transporting all of the military leaders — some of whom will be traveling from the Middle East, Europe and the Indo-Pacific — will be in the millions of dollars. The event has also raised security concerns about having all the top leadership in one place, particularly given that Tuesday is the end of the fiscal year, and if the government shuts down, it could leave key personnel stranded from their units.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the president’s travel for Tuesday’s speech.
Hegseth has committed to reducing the general officer corps by 20 percent and has fired without cause roughly two dozen senior officers — a disproportionate number of them female general or flag officers — since he was sworn in.
Hegseth is seriously considering reducing the rank of the top commanding generals at several top posts from four to three stars and proposing a significant consolidation of the combatant commands, which are major regional headquarters focused on areas such as Africa, the Middle East and the Indo-Pacific, several officials familiar with that planning who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal deliberations told The Post.
All of those moves come as the administration’s new national defense strategy is expected to significantly shift attention and resources away from preparing for a conflict with China to sharply focus on homeland defense and military use at home.
On Saturday, Trump in a Truth Social post called for the Pentagon to send troops to what he deemed “War ravaged” Portland, Oregon, authorizing them to use “Full Force” to protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement sites that have drawn sporadic protesters. The order was not clear as to whether he intended to send troops under federal control or activate troops under state control, but any deployment could be challenged in court. Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek (D) said she doesn’t believe Trump has the authority to deploy federal troops on state soil and is working with the attorney general on a potential response.
Trump’s deployment order also comes just days after he signed an executive order directing the nation’s law enforcement and military capabilities to be used against “domestic terrorism and organized political violence,” an edict that gives the administration sweeping powers to investigate and prosecute a broad array of political opponents.
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