Sen. Kelly Details How He Learned Of Hegseth’s Threats To Court-Martial Him | EUROtoday

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) on Monday condemned the best way he discovered he might be court-martialed for taking part within the “illegal orders” video that includes him and a handful of different Democratic lawmakers in mid-November.

“The court-martial, [Secretary of Defense Pete] Hegseth notified me in a tweet. I mean, how ridiculous is this? That this guy, I mean, it’s not a normal process, [it] doesn’t make any sense,” Kelly mentioned Monday on CNN’s “The Lead with Jake Tapper.”

The retired Navy fighter pilot continued, “He tweeted something, that’s how I got notified. That’s all I’ve heard from the Navy, and that says everything about Pete Hegseth.”

Kelly was referring to a Nov. 24 X put up shared on the White House Department of War account. The division, which Hegseth oversees, wrote that it was conducting a “thorough review” that would probably result in court-martial proceedings.

Kelly’s feedback got here after host Tapper requested him whether or not the army had contacted him or the FBI had reached out to him for an interview following the discharge of the video.

Last week, the FBI mentioned it’s working to schedule interviews with the lawmakers within the video. President Donald Trump decried the video as “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR” on social media and appeared to endorse a put up that known as for the lawmakers to be executed.

However, a bunch of former army prosecutors famous that the Pentagon doubtless wouldn’t be capable of punish Kelly.

Also, Kelly and different Democrats have but to specify any precise unlawful orders issued by Trump. Appearing on ABC’s “This Week” on Nov. 23, Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), one of many different lawmakers featured within the video, admitted she was “not aware” that any such orders had been made.

Speaking with Tapper on Monday, Kelly accused Hegseth of being centered on seeing “how many views he can get on Twitter,” including, “that’s what he cares about — he doesn’t care about the law or process.”

Kelly then doubled down on his repeated claims that Trump is participating in a “bullying” marketing campaign after the president mentioned Kelly and the opposite Democratic lawmakers ought to “be in jail.”

“Was this the idea of the FBI? Or was this Donald Trump telling the director to tell the FBI to come after us? He’s trying to intimidate us. That’s what he did when he said ‘hang them, execute them,’” he added. “I’m not going to be intimidated by this president or this secretary of defense, and I’m not going to be silenced.”

Watch a clip from Kelly’s CNN look under.