GOP senator ‘disappointed’ over departure of Army secretary who clashed with Hegseth

Sen. Mike Rounds (S.D.), a senior Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he was “disappointed” to learn of the resignation of Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll and expressed concern about the broader turnover of senior military officers under Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

“I was disappointed. I think he’s been a pretty solid guy. So disappointed,” Rounds said of Discroll’s departure from the Army after clashing with Hegseth over the ouster of key senior officials, such as Gen. Randy George, who served as the Army’s chief of staff, and Christopher Donahue, the top U.S. Army commander in Europe.

Rounds said he understood Driscoll’s departure was linked to disagreements over the firing or forced resignation of senior leaders under Hegseth.

“I’m hearing the same rumors everybody else is that he was frustrated with some of his top generals being released. That’s not the first time I’ve heard that. I think that points to questions that we’re going to be asking when we get back,” Rounds said, referring to the questions senators will have of Hegseth and Pentagon leaders about turmoil at the Pentagon.

The Senate is in the midst of a five-week recess and is scheduled to reconvene in Washington on Sept. 14.

“Where’s the leadership at? We’ve had some very good generals that are no longer there that we respected and had a huge amount of foundational knowledge in terms of moving us forward as far as the changing capabilities we need to incorporate in the fighting force,” Rounds said.

GOP senators have expressed concern over the departure of senior officials, such as George, for months.

Driscoll, an Iraq War veteran and former adviser to Vice President JD Vance, championed the development of a drone warfare initiative to learn lessons from the drone-intensive fighting from the Ukrainian-Russian war.

That initiative was shut down by acting Army Chief of Staff Christopher LaNeve. LaNeve ordered special European battalion specializing in drone warfare to refocus on its core mission of being an airborne infantry unit, according to the Associated Press .

Rounds questioned the effort by some senior officials viewed as more aligned with Hegseth to shut down efforts to develop new strategies and tactics for drone warfare by pointing out that drone-intensive tactics appears to be a significant and lasting evolution of military doctrine.

“This issue that’s going on with regard to Ukraine, the use of drones, the integration of drones into this — this is not a new thing that just happened. We’ve been watching this ever since 2021. … Watching the Ukrainians do a marvelous job with drones. We’ve been watching this,” he said.

Rounds also talked about the importance of the “integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into our offensive and our defensive capabilities.”

“We know that our adversaries are doing it right now and the question is, ‘Are we keeping up with them?’ ‘Are they keeping up with us?’ But we’ve got real serious issues there that we need to be able to fund and direct and those are things we can’t wait six months to do,” he added.

Asked if he still has confidence in Hegseth’s leadership, Rounds said that question is entirely up to President Trump.

“It’s not a matter or not of whether we are. It’s a matter of whether the president is” confident in Hegseth’s leadership, he said.

“The president chooses who he wants for his key leaders. I think they’re trying. We want to see results,” he said.

GOP lawmakers are growing increasingly frustrated with Hegseth’s leadership of the Defense Department as the war with Iran has dragged on for six months now with no clear end in sight.