‘You failed our country’: Pa. lawmakers vote along party lines in failed move to impeach Pete Hegseth

Pennsylvania’s federal lawmakers voted along party lines Tuesday in an unsuccessful effort to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over his handling of the war in Iran, accusations of international war crimes, and more.

Republican leaders in the U.S. House sidestepped the mostly Democrat-backed move, likely setting up another attempt to remove Hegseth when Democrats take control of the chamber in January.

The vote fell one week after Democrats swept four competitive swing races in Pennsylvania, unseating Republicans in a nationwide blue wave driven in large part by frustrations with President Donald Trump’s handling of the war.

U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R., Bucks), who lost his bid for a sixth term to Democratic Bucks County Commissioner Bob Harvie, was the only one of 11 Pennsylvania House Republicans to previously vote for war powers resolutions to end Trump’s unilateral ability to attack Iran.

But Fitzpatrick had also not criticized Trump for beginning the war, which many Democrats said was illegal from the start because it didn’t receive congressional approval.

Fitzpatrick ultimately joined his Republican colleagues in voting to defer a final, official vote on the impeachment resolution.

Another Pennsylvanian who lost his seat after making a last-minute push to put some distance between himself and the war — U.S. Rep. Rob Bresnahan (R., Luzerne) — also voted against considering the impeachment. Bresnahan, who lost to Democratic Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti after serving just one term, said during a late October debate that “the mission has been accomplished and the war absolutely needs to end,” though he also said withdrawal had to be “pragmatic.”

The resolution with eight separate articles of impeachment was filed Monday by outgoing U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican who lost his seat after becoming a vocal critic of Trump and the war.

The articles accused Hegseth of high crimes and misdemeanors for starting the war in Iran, continuing to wage it after the passage of war powers resolutions and ignoring laws aimed at minimizing civilian casualties.

Massie was the only Republican who ultimately voted to advance the resolution while Democrats, who have for months called for Hegseth’s removal, united behind it. Entering the majority in January, they had promised to impeach the secretary then if Republicans wouldn’t help to do it now.

“We’re coming for you because you failed our country,” U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, an Allegheny County Democrat and Navy veteran, said in a video featuring veteran Democratic lawmakers, released earlier Tuesday by the nonprofit Vet Voice Foundation.

U.S. Rep. Chrissy Houlahan, a Chester County Democrat and Air Force veteran, was also featured in the video — criticizing Hegseth’s leadership and, specifically, the episode in 2025 when he shared classified information in a Signal group chat that accidentally included a reporter. The incident risked the safety of service members, an independent review found.

Both Houlahan and Deluzio were also among the group of six veterans serving in Congress who last year called on service members to “refuse illegal orders” from the administration. Trump and Hegseth lashed out in response, leading to an investigation that failed to indict the lawmakers. And the Pentagon’s retaliation against U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly, of Arizona, for the same message was the justification for one of the impeachment resolutions against Hegseth on Tuesday.

“He wants to pretend that calling out his failures, his incompetence and his zealotry is an attack on our men and women in uniform,” Houlahan said on the House floor. “And he has done so while preening and peacocking all over the world, in push up contests and PT stunts, using our service members as props. Our nation deserves a real secretary of defense who will not be laughed out of every room in the Pentagon, in Brussels and in Congress.”

Neither U.S. Sens. Dave McCormick, a Republican, or John Fetterman, a Democrat, immediately reacted to the impeachment vote. If Democrats make another attempt in 2027 and pass a resolution with their large majority, the Senate would have to vote to convict Hegseth. Both Pennsylvanians have been staunch supporters of the war effort. Fetterman has been the only senator from his party to vote against the war resolutions while echoing Trump’s justifications for the war.

Hegseth, meanwhile, defended his record Tuesday as Trump and Vice President JD Vance said they stood by him.

“This isn’t about Iran, this is about the fact that Pete took on the bureaucracy at the Pentagon,” Vance said on social media.

Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro, whose election to a second term last week has further fueled speculation that he will launch a campaign for the White House in 2028, called Hegseth “completely incompetent” during an interview on Meet the Press over the weekend.

“He is like an 8-year-old playing with toy soldiers every day,” he said while declining to say if he supported impeachment specifically. “He is someone who I think is making America less safe, and there has to be real accountability.”