Pete Hegseth Was Removed from Biden’s Inauguration, Labeled ‘Extremist’

On Tuesday Donald Trump announced Pete Hegseth, a Fox News commentator who saw active service with the Minnesota National Guard, as his pick for secretary of defense.
Hegseth was one of a number of National Guard members ordered to stand down from Joe Biden’s inauguration, according to CBS News reporter Jim LaPorta.
Hegseth served in both Iraq and Afghanistan during his time as a National Guard officer, and in 2012 announced he was running in the Republican primary for a U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota, though he dropped out before voting began. Earlier this year he published The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free.
In a statement posted on social media Trump said: “Pete has spent his entire life as a Warrior for the Troops, and for the Country. Pete is tough, smart and a true believer in America First.”
Why Was Pete Hegseth Prevented From Attending Biden’s Inauguration?
During an appearance on a podcast hosted by Shawn Ryan, a former Navy Seal and CIA contractor, Hegseth claimed he had been due to help guard Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential inauguration but was ordered to stand down because he had an “extremist” tattoo.
He said: “I was deemed an extremist because of a tattoo by my National Guard unit in Washington D.C. and my orders were revoked to guard the Biden inauguration…
“My commander called me a day before tepidly and was like Major you can just stand down. We don’t need you, we’re good. I’m like what do you mean, everybody’s there. He said like no no no…he couldn’t tell me.”
Hegseth added that when writing his book “he reached out to somebody in the unit who could confirm with 99.9 percent certainty, because he was in the meetings and on the emails, nope someone inside the D.C. Guard trolled your social media, found a tattoo, used it an excuse to call you a white nationalist, an extremist, and you were specifically by name orders revoked to guard the inauguration because you were considered a potential threat.”
Newsweek contacted the Minnesota National Guard, Donald Trump’s presidential election team and Pete Hegseth, via the Fox News press office, for comment on Wednesday by email outside of regular office hours.
In January 2021 The Associated Press reported 12 National Guard members had been removed from guarding Biden’s inauguration after they were linked to “right-wing militia groups,” or found to have “posted extremist views online.”
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, CBS News reporter Jim LaPorta said one of these 12 National Guard members was Hegseth.
The Pentagon authorized the deployment of up to 25,000 National Guard troops to protect Biden’s inauguration on 20 January. It followed the January 6 Capitol Hill riot during which hundreds of Trump supporters stormed Congress in a bid to prevent Biden’s election victory from being ratified. In the ensuing violence one Trump supporter was shot dead and dozens of police officers were injured.
During his appearance on Ryan’s podcast Hegseth showed the tattoo that he claimed resulted in him being removed from guarding the 2020 presidential inauguration, describing it as the “Jerusalem Cross tattoo, which is just a Christian symbol.”
The Jerusalem Cross features one large cross, symbolizing Jesus Christ’s crucifixion, with an additional smaller cross in each quadrant, adding up to four smaller crosses in total. Each cross is square in design, resembling a plus sign, and extends a little further out at the end of each arm. Hegseth’s Jerusalem Cross tattoo is situated across his chest.
After Jerusalem was captured from the Muslim Fatimid Caliphate during the First Crusade in 1099 an independent Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem was founded, lasting nearly 200 years before being conquered by Islamic armies. The Jerusalem Cross was adopted as a symbol of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, one of four independent states carved out of Palestine, Lebanon and Syria by Christian warriors following the First Crusade.
In recent years some right-wing nationalist groups have adopted Crusader imagery, including depictions of Templar Knights and the Crusader slogan Deus vult, Latin for “God wills it.”