Donald Trump Jr. rips into ex-Pete Hegseth staffer exiled from MAGA movement for trying to secretly tear it down

Donald Trump Jr. torched former Pentagon spokesman John Ullyot who warned that the department of defense is in chaos in a Politico op-ed released Sunday and suggested it was time for Secretary Pete Hegseth to resign.

This guy is not America First, Trumps son wrote on social media. I’ve been hearing for years that he works his ass off to subvert my father’s agenda. That ends today. He’s officially exiled from our movement.

Ullyot resigned from the Pentagon complaining of a month from hell in the agency which resulted int a near collapse that led the secretary to fire three of his most loyal senior staffers senior adviser Dan Caldwell, deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick and Colin Carroll, chief of staff to the deputy secretary of Defense.

The last month has been a full-blown meltdown at the Pentagon — and it’s becoming a real problem for the administration, he wrote, noting that he was a strong backer of Hegseth in the beginning.

But MAGA allies pushed back against Ullyot, recalling his service in Trumps first administration in the department of veterans affairs and on the national security council in the White House.

Ullyot is universally regarded in Trumpworld as an incompetent buffoon who sucks at his job. I told Pete to fire him as soon as I heard that he got a job at the Pentagon, wrote MAGA-connected political consultant Arthur Schwartz in reaction to the news.  

Sources familiar with Ullyot tell DailyMail.com that he was pushed out of his job at the Pentagon and had a record of being incompetent and untrustworthy. 

Hegseth told Fox News on Tuesday that he was disappointed by the revelations involved in the investigation of media leaks but laid out his reasoning for firing three of his top advisors.

Donald Trump Jr. criticized former Pentagon spokesman John Ullyot

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth takes a phone call at the 2025 Easter Egg Roll at the White House

Pentagon Press Secretary John Ullyot listens as U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth answers a reporters question

 We took it seriously. It led to some unfortunate places, people I have known for quite some time, he said. But its not my job to protect them. Its my job to protect national security, the president of the United States.

Hegseth also cryptically reacted to Ullyots service, accusing him of spinning his work to the media to fit a different narrative. 

Anyone who knows John knows why we let him go, we did a lot of favors for John, he did some good work upfront and he was moved along and asked to move along, now he has misrepresented a lot of things in the press, its unfortunate, he said, attributing the op-ed as politics. 

The White House defended Hegseths performance on Tuesday, saying the recent firings at the Pentagon were about leaks.

They were Pentagon employees who leaked against their boss to news agencies in this room, and its been clear since Day One from this administration that we are not going to tolerate individuals who leak to the mainstream media, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said at the White House press briefing. 

She repeated that Hegseth was doing a tremendous job and continued to have support from the president. 

He is bringing monumental change to the Pentagon and theres a lot of people in this city who reject monumental change and I think, frankly, thats why weve seen a smear campaign against the Secretary of Defense, she said.