{"id":13238,"date":"2026-07-22T05:00:52","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T00:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=13238"},"modified":"2026-07-22T05:00:52","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T00:00:52","slug":"sen-kirsten-gillibrand-grills-hegseth-on-iran-statements","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=13238","title":{"rendered":"Sen Kirsten Gillibrand Grills Hegseth on Iran Statements"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-body\">\n<p>Sen. <strong>Kirsten Gillibrand<\/strong> (D-NY) got into a heated exchange with Secretary of Defense <strong>Pete Hegseth<\/strong> as she grilled him during a hearing on past statements on Iran she said just \u201cdon\u2019t add up.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During a Tuesday Senate <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/media\/tv\/senator-calls-hegseth-a-failure-to-his-face-setting-off-heated-exchange\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">hearing<\/a>, Gillibrand confronted Hegseth with past statements from him and the administration on the Iran war that she called contradictory, leading to confusion among the public about the actual status of the conflict.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/tag\/kirsten-gillibrand\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Gillibrand<\/a> said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>The reason why they are so upset with you and this administration is because the words you have used in the past don\u2019t add up about Iran specifically. You said that we had obliterated, quote, unquote, Iran\u2019s ability to create nuclear weapons. The president made the same claim, yet eight months later in February of 2026, the president launched an active war claiming Iran was within two weeks of having a weapon. So when you say two very different things, the American people don\u2019t know who to believe or what to believe. They just know they can\u2019t afford their healthcare, they can\u2019t afford their food, they can\u2019t get affordable housing, and our farmers are continuing to suffer. So, which is true, was it obliterated or wasn\u2019t it? What\u2019s the status?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/tag\/pete-hegseth\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Hegseth<\/a> said Iran\u2019s nuclear sites were destroyed in Operation Midnight Hammer last year, but the regime continued attempting to procure \u201cnuclear capabilities.\u201d The secretary accused Gillibrand of trying to make \u201ccampaign commercials\u201d with her time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe nuclear sites under Midnight Hammer were obliterated, but Iranians foolishly continued to attempt to pursue nuclear capabilities, which is why we destroyed their defense industrial base and so many of the other capabilities to ensure they can\u2019t get to a nuclear weapon. So we\u2019re staying laser focused on the objective and you\u2019re trying to make campaign commercials,\u201d Hegseth said.<\/p>\n<p>Gillibrand answered by pulling out another quote from Hegseth on the war.<\/p>\n<p>She said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>No, we\u2019re not. So listen to this. You also say that you made the missile program, quote, destroyed and made combat ineffective, quote, Iran\u2019s entire ballistic missile production capacity, every company that builds every component of those missiles has been functionally defeated and destroyed, and that the missile program, existing stockpiles were depleted and decimated, almost completely ineffective. So why are there missiles left to hit Jordan and result in the loss of life of our brave men and women?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Hegseth said Iran is using \u201cunderground facilities\u201d where they have stored missiles.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Iranian defense industrial base is effectively gone, but they do have underground facilities because they\u2019re the world\u2019s leading state sponsor of terrorism, and they\u2019ve spent 47 years trying to hide their missiles under mountains, just like their nuclear capabilities, because they would like to get a nuclear weapon,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Gillibrand moved on from the war after telling Hegseth Americans don\u2019t know \u201cwhich version\u201d of the war to believe.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe just don\u2019t know what version of the war to believe because it\u2019s either over or it\u2019s not over. It\u2019s within two weeks or it is not two weeks,\u201d she said. \u201cWe have no missiles or we have missiles. And that consternation is why so many New Yorkers are perplexed, stressed out, and find this war to be incredibly unpopular because they don\u2019t understand the choices that the president\u2019s making. They don\u2019t agree with those choices.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Watch above via <a href=\"https:\/\/www.c-span.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">CSPAN<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>New: The Mediaite One-Sheet &#8220;Newsletter of Newsletters&#8221;<\/strong><br \/>Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/subscribe\">Subscribe now!<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;\nn.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,\ndocument,'script','https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) got into a heated exchange with Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth as she grilled him during a hearing on past statements on Iran she said just \u201cdon\u2019t add up.\u201d During a Tuesday Senate hearing, Gillibrand confronted Hegseth with past statements from him and the administration on the Iran war that she&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13239,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/hegseth-1.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsweek-trending"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13238"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13238\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13239"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}