Washington - Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday he is ending a Department of Defense program that promotes women's participation in peacebuilding and signed into law by President Trump in 2017.
Hegseth said in his initial post on X that the Women's Peace and Security Plan "wakes up the division/social justice/Biden Initiative again, bringing our commanders and troops over." In subsequent posts, he clarified that the plan had been "destroyed" by the Biden administration.
Heggs said the Department of Defense will comply with the minimum requirements set by the law, but will "terminate" the plan when Congress sets its next budget.
Trump administration officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, supported the effort in Congress. Mr. Trump's daughter, Ivanka Trump, also advocated for this, who served in his first term.
Earlier this month, Rubio touted the bill and said in his speech at the State Department that he was proud to support the bill. He called it "the first law passed by any country in the world to protect women and promote their participation in society."
According to strategies published during Mr. Trump’s first term, the program seeks to increase women’s participation in decision-making processes and promote the protection of women and girls around the world.
New Hampshire Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen, who introduced the plan's legislation, said the Secretary of Defense "is invisible and does not really understand what he is doing" when CBS News was about Hegseth's post on Hegseth about X.
"We have data showing how different it is to have women on the table in negotiations," Shaheen said. "We know that the last 35% of the peace agreement reached with women on the table is longer, and if women are on the table, it's more than 15 years." On Sunday's "Facing the Country," Shaheen criticized Heggsshe said, in the recent employee restructuring, the Pentagon “caused chaos” at the Pentagon.
“For those who serve under him, he shows that he is not that role model, not the kind of leader we need right now,” Shahain said.
One of Hegseth's goals at the Pentagon is to get rid of the Department of Defense for the diversity, equity and inclusion program.
Kathleen McInnis of the Center for Strategic and International Studies wrote that the Women, Peace and Security Program is not a DEI because it does not establish requirements, quotas or targets for the Department of Defense organization composition, academic admission or career fields.
When asked in a confirmation hearing confirming the program, Heggs did not promise to continue, but he said he would “commit to reviewing the program and ensure that it is with the first national security priorities of the United States, elite domination, lethality and ready.”