Outgoing GOP senator finally finds his spine and shreds Pete Hegseth

Sen. Thom Tillis may be heading for the exits, but he’s not leaving quietly.

The retiring Republican from North Carolina—who stunned the political world in June, when he announced he wouldn’t seek reelection—suggested to CNN’s Jake Tapper on Wednesday that he regrets casting the deciding vote to confirm Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

“With the passing of time, I think it’s clear he’s out of his depth as a manager of a large, complex organization,” Tillis said, pointing to Hegseth inadvertently sharing military attack plans with a journalist and, more recently, pausing weapons shipments to Ukraine without informing the White House.

“That’s just amateurish,” he added about the Ukraine pause. “That’s from somebody who doesn’t understand large organization dynamics.”

It’s the first time Tillis has spoken at length with the national media since his retirement announcement, which came just one day after President Donald Trump threatened to back a primary challenger over Tillis’ opposition to the bill carrying Trump’s domestic agenda.

Trump also threatened Tillis earlier this year. In January, Tillis reportedly worked behind the scenes to corroborate abuse allegations against Hegseth, and even urged Senate GOP leadership to pull the nomination. But after Trump floated backing a primary challenge, Tillis folded and voted “yes,” despite concerns about Hegseth’s alleged history of excessive drinking and alleged abuse of women.

Now that reelection’s off the table, Tillis admits he might’ve voted differently if the confirmation came up today.

“If all I had was the information on the day of the vote, I’d certainly vote for him again,” he told CNN. “But now I have the information of him being a manager, and I don’t think his probationary period has been very positive.”

Tillis also voiced regret about another Cabinet pick he supported—Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—but Tillis said he relied on the judgment of fellow Republicans in both instances. For Hegseth, it was the Armed Services Committee. For Kennedy, it was Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who has a medical degree and chairs the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.

“The main reason I supported Kennedy was because Bill Cassidy thought that we should see how it plays out,” he said. 

Tillis also took a swipe at Trump’s new domestic policy law, which will slash Medicaid and food-assistance benefits to partially fund tax cuts and immigration enforcement. Only three Republican senators voted against it—Tillis among them.

“What do I tell 663,000 people in two years or three years, when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there anymore?” Tillis said in a scathing floor speech as the bill was going through Congress.

But even now Tillis avoids criticizing Trump directly, instead blaming the president’s inner circle.

“What the president needs to do is start really looking at the outcome of some of these policy decisions and ask himself, is he really getting the best professional advice?” he told CNN, adding, “But as somebody who’s been in elected office for 20 years at the leadership level in the statehouse and doing all I can up here, I hope that [Trump] starts listening to more of us and fewer of those people who pretend like they’re the president when he’s out of the room.”

Tillis may be free to speak his mind now. But for those living with the fallout of his votes—especially the one that put Hegseth in charge—it’s too little, too late.