Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) defended former Fox News host Pete Hegseth on Sunday against allegations of sexual assault, saying Donald Trump’s Defense Secretary nominee was “falsely accused.”
Mullin joined CNN’s Dana Bash for “State of the Union,” where he was asked about the sexual assault allegations made against Hegseth by a woman in 2017 after a California Federation of Republican Women conference.
According to a police report from the Monterey, Calif., police department the victim said she “remembered saying ‘no’ a lot” and alleged that Hegseth prevented her from leaving his hotel room.
On Sunday Mullin aggressively defended Hegseth, arguing that the woman was “flirting” with the then-Fox News host before leading them back to Hegseth’s hotel room.
“There was no case here. He was falsely accused!” Mullin said. “If you go back and you read the report, there was two eyewitnesses said that she was being the aggressor — Pete wasn’t even flirting with her. He was flirting with a different girl. And the other girl was trying to flirt with Pete.”
Asked if he believe Hegseth’s side of the story more than the accuser, Mullin said, “I absolutely do.”
“He wasn’t charged,” Mullin continued. “He wasn’t even kind of charged. There was no crime committed.”
Last week, Hegseth’s attorney confirmed that he paid a “confidential financial settlement” to the accuser but it was because he feared that if she came forward it “would result in his immediate termination from Fox.”
