CNN
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House Republicans have thwarted Democratic efforts to probe Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s controversial use of Signal, using their power to stop the minority party from forcing a vote that could embarrass the Trump administration.
GOP leaders tucked a provision into a rule approved Tuesday that effectively prevents Democrats from forcing a vote on “resolutions of inquiry,” a tool often used by the minority to try to launch an investigation. Such resolutions typically fail, but with controversy mounting over Hegseth’s use of Signal to communicate military plans, Republicans wanted to avoid a vote that could succeed in the narrowly divided chamber if just a handful of GOP members broke ranks.
It marks just the latest instance of House Speaker Mike Johnson moving to change House rules to spare President Donald Trump and his administration the prospect of a politically bruising vote rather than let the House work its will. Johnson before blocked a bipartisan House and Senate effort to rein in presidential authority on tariffs.
“We’re using the rules of the House to prevent political hijinks and political stunts. And that’s what the Democrats have,” Johnson said prior to the floor vote, defending the move to defang Democrats’ effort by dismissing it as a stunt.
“So we’re preventing this nonsensical waste of our time. We don’t have time to waste,” he added.
As CNN previously reported, a renewed focus was placed on the Pentagon chief following revelations that he shared detailed plans about a military operation against the Houthis in Yemen on a second Signal group chat, this one on his personal phone and including his wife, lawyer and brother.
That chat was in addition to one Hegseth used to communicate with Cabinet officials last month about military plans.
The top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Adam Smith, was leading the charge on a so-called resolution of inquiry, planning to force a vote calling on Trump and Hegseth to turn over all communications about military operations against the Houthis that had been shared on the app. Had Republicans failed to block that resolution, a full House vote would have been triggered.
Instead, Smith’s resolution won’t get a full chamber vote before September 30.
“They’re afraid of the issue and they want to cover it up,” Smith said earlier Tuesday ahead of the panel’s meeting on a $150 billion defense package that would be part of Republicans’ larger budget reconciliation bill.
“They don’t want to address it, and they don’t want to deal with it. And that means that Hegseth is just going to keep doing it. So it’s shocking really that they don’t want to exercise even the barest minimum of oversight over the Pentagon,” the Washington state Democrat said.
The move from GOP leadership did not go without criticism from some in the conference.
“Rules should be about the bills we’re voting on and not putting extraneous things in, and especially it looks like they try to sneak it in there. I don’t like that. It should be a little more transparent,” said Rep. Don Bacon, who has before suggested an openness to Trump firing the defense secretary.
While the Nebraska Republican suggested that “we already know what happened with Signalgate,” he said he intended to express his concerns about the situation to leadership.
Hegseth, Bacon said, “hurt himself by not being honest and just taking responsibility.”
“Credibility is most important thing we have in this town. And when you don’t acknowledge you made a mistake or then you don’t … you’re not honest about it, your credibility’s shot,” he said, later adding, “If you just said, ‘I screwed up, and I was wrong.’ People say they would respect that, but he didn’t do that.”
CNN’s Alison Main, Casey Riddle and Haley Talbot contributed to this report.
