Thom Thillis and the Hegseth nomination
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The night before Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.) cast the fateful 50th “yes” vote to confirm Pete Hegseth as defense secretary, he approached the Senate’s new Republican leader and told him he was a “no.”
That Thursday night, Tillis told Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.), who was less than a month into his new role, that there were enough votes to defeat Hegseth.
But Thune said that was Tillis’s problem—not his problem—and that Tillis could go to the White House and tell President Trump himself.
Over the next 24 hours, Tillis would go from no to the decisive yes vote for Trump’s controversial pick to lead the Pentagon. This story of how he flipped—a last-minute blitz by the president, vice president, the Republican whip team and Hegseth himself—shows how political and party pressure came to bear on a vulnerable senator facing re-election next year and on witnesses who came forward and received assurances of protection from Tillis, only to become collateral damage in the fight for a single vote.
Gift link. I hope. First time I'm doing this WSJ gift link; I'm accessing the WSJ via my library.
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Weak. Very weak.
