House Derailed the Hegseth Impeachment Drive, 211–204: Massie's Eight Articles Go to Committee, and the Fight Waits for January
The House voted 211–204 on Tuesday to send Representative Thomas Massie's eight impeachment articles against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to the Judiciary Committee — a procedural move that effectively stops the effort in this Congress. Massie was the only Republican to vote against the referral; Hegseth had called the drive a farce hours earlier, and Democrats, who take the House in January, are expected to decide whether it returns.
WASHINGTON — Republicans in the House banded together on Tuesday to derail an effort to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, voting 211 to 204 to refer the impeachment charges to the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee, Reuters reported. The referral effectively stops the effort sponsored by Kentucky Republican Representative Thomas Massie, who was the only Republican to vote against the motion.
Massie introduced eight articles of impeachment on Monday. Three are tied to the war in Iran — he accuses Hegseth of directing and sustaining military action beyond a 60-day limit without a declaration of war or an authorization for the use of military force — and the rest reach to Venezuela, to strikes in Yemen, and to an alleged retaliation against Democratic Senator Mark Kelly's speech, per Reuters' explainer. The articles are allegations, not findings: the House never voted on their merits. Hegseth has denied wrongdoing, and at a Pentagon news conference on Tuesday — his first since May — he called the impeachment moves a farce that would fail, Reuters reported. President Donald Trump pledged to stand by his defense secretary and posted on Truth Social on Tuesday that the attempt 'has miserably FAILED,' USA TODAY reported.
The margin was close enough that attendance mattered: 11 Democrats and seven Republicans did not vote, USA TODAY reported, and Massie needed only a handful of Republicans to join a unified Democratic bloc to force a debate on the articles themselves. None did. Massie, who lost his primary and leaves Congress at the end of the year, has said he has no plan to reintroduce the articles — and that Democrats are likely to pursue the effort when they take control of the House in January, when this resolution will have expired and a new sponsor would have to file it again.
For Texas, the vote lands on the state's large military footprint — Fort Cavazos, Joint Base San Antonio and Fort Bliss all take their orders from Hegseth's Pentagon — and on a Texas delegation that voted with its parties. The question the lame-duck House deferred on Tuesday is now a January question: whether the incoming Democratic majority spends its first weeks on the cost-of-living agenda its own polling favors, or reopens an impeachment fight its voters also watched fail by seven votes.
