Several Republican senators lambasted the Department of Defense’s (DOD) policy office and its leader for not informing the Senate Armed Services Committee about major decisions, including the withdrawal of some U.S. troops from Romania and halting of some assistance to Ukraine.
“It looks to us like some of the big decisions coming out of the policy shop at the Pentagon are undermining what the president’s trying to get done,” Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) said.
Sullivan and other Republican senators hammered Austin Dahmer, the nominee for assistant secretary of Defense for strategy, plans and capabilities, during a confirmation hearing for President Trump’s DOD nominees Tuesday. Dahmer, if confirmed, will report to Elbridge Colby, the under secretary of Defense for policy, whom the lawmakers said is nearly impossible to reach.
“You know who the hardest guy to get a hold of in the Trump administration is? The undersecretary of Defense for policy. I hope he’s watching. I’m meeting with him tomorrow. Maybe he’ll cancel on me. I don’t know,” Sullivan said Tuesday.
This frustration among lawmakers, including Democrats, marks the latest example of tensions between Capitol Hill and the DOD during Trump’s second term. The Hill has reached out to the Pentagon for comment.
Tuesday’s committee hearing, in addition to Dahmer, featured Robert Kadlec, the pick for assistant secretary of Defense for nuclear deterrence and chemical and biological defense policy and programs, and Michael Borders Jr., the nominee for assistant secretary of the Air Force for energy, installations and environment.
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, echoed Sullivan’s view and slammed the Pentagon’s policy office over what he described as a lack of information sharing.
Wicker said the committee has a “relatively positive relationship” with the Pentagon, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Deputy Secretary of Defense Steve Feinberg, but the policy office is a different matter.
“I’ve been disappointed to find one exception to that cordiality. Members and staff of this committee have struggled to receive information from the policy office and have not been able to consult in a meaningful way with the shop, either on the national defense strategy or the global posture review,” Wicker said on Tuesday.
The Mississippi Republican said he did not confront this problem during Trump’s first term, adding that the current “situation needs to improve if we are to craft the best defense policy.”
Senators pointed to several decisions from Colby’s office during Tuesday’s hearing, stating they had not been notified about changes in defense policy.
Changes include last week’s move to withdraw a rotational brigade from Romania, the DOD’s review of the AUKUS submarine pact and the Pentagon’s pause of some shipments to Ukraine earlier this year, the lawmakers said.
Dahmer claimed that Congress was briefed three times ahead of the U.S. decision to pull the brigade from Romania, an assertion that was met with skepticism from GOP senators.
“That was not done to our knowledge. I just checked with staff from the majority and the minority, and the information I have is that was not communicated,” Wicker told Dahmer.
When asked where he received that information, Dahmer said he got it from DOD’s legislative affairs arm.
“I think all of us would like to have more information on how the decision was made,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) added.
Dahmer said that Romania was notified ahead of the troop withdrawal’s public disclosure, but when asked by Scott when the European country was told, he said he did not know and vowed to follow up with the Florida Republican.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who chairs the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, characterized the Colby’s office as a “pigpen-like mess,” citing news reporting.
Dahmer responded, stating there is a lot of “fake news out there” and “a lot of inaccurate reporting.”
Democrats on the committee reflected their Republican colleagues frustration, also slamming the policy office over a lack of urgency in communicating matters to the legislative body.
“We see no sense of urgency to connect with Congress pre-publication of the NDS, and we are the article one coequal branch,” Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen (D) added, referring to the National Defense Strategy (NDS).
NDS is typically released every four years, outlining the primary threats to U.S. national security, and sets priorities for adapting the military to new technologies and serves as a guide to where to place U.S. troops worldwide.
