Secret Vetting and Blocked Promotions: Inside Hegseth's War on Diversity

Secret Vetting and Blocked Promotions: Inside Hegseth’s War on Diversity
A Black admiral fixed one of the Navy’s worst messes. Mr. Hegseth blocked his promotion anyway.

The Navy’s top leadership believed that Rear Adm. Stephen D. Barnett was by far the best choice to lead the command that oversees the Navy’s bases at home and abroad.

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The officer, however, had a big strike against him. Like other Black military leaders, he had been encouraged by his superiors to help the Navy recruit and retain minority officers, who remain significantly underrepresented in the force. His years-old remarks on the importance of diversity had been flagged in a secret vetting process designed to weed out senior leaders whom Mr. Hegseth and his team pegged as a problem.

Instead of Admiral Barnett, Mr. Hegseth selected a white officer who was the Navy leadership’s third choice.

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Last year, Mr. Hegseth and his top aides ordered the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps to do online searches of the officers selected by the boards, to look for photos, videos or news articles that might draw Mr. Hegseth’s ire, current and former defense officials said.

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Soon Mr. Hegseth was pulling officers from nearly every active duty and reserve officer promotion list. Officers who had spoken publicly about the importance of diversity in the ranks were removed from lists. So too were those who had strongly urged their troops to get the Covid vaccine.

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Military officials, though, said they have noticed patterns. Officers who had commanded aircraft carriers or amphibious assault ships have been especially vulnerable. The reason: Those ships have public affairs sailors on board who documented their skippers participating in events related to diversity or the Covid vaccine.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/19/us/politics/hegseth-navy-blocked-promotions-diversity.html