More Trouble For Pete: Defense Secretary Hegseth Accused of PLAGIARISM By Princeton Student Newspaper — As Calls Mount For 'Pentagon Princess' To Be Fired
Pete Hegseth has been accused of plagiarism on his senior thesis.
May 12 2025, Published 4:30 p.m. ET
Pete Hegseth has found himself embroiled in another controversy, RadarOnline.com can reveal.
President Trump's Secretary of Defense has been accused of plagiarism on his college thesis – and the claim came from his alma mater Princeton University.
The defense secretary was called out by his alma mater.
Hegseth attended Princeton from 1999-2003. On Monday, the school's student newspaper, The Daily Princetonian, published a review of his senior thesis, including a review of the document by three plagiarism experts.
They found the paper, Modern Presidential Rhetoric and the Cold War Context, contains eight instances of "uncredited material, sham paraphrasing, and verbatim copying."
The experts were not told the identity of the author before assessing the work, so as not to influence their findings.
Copy Cat
Experts found eight instances of plagiarism.
In one example, Hegseth wrote about President George W. Bush’s reaction to being told of the first attack on the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001.
Hegseth wrote: "After Card's whisper, Bush looked distracted and somber but continued to listen to the second-graders, joking that they 'read like sixth-graders.'"
However, the investigation found an article from The Washington Post, published shortly after the 2001 attacks, which read: "After Card‘s whisper, Bush looked distracted and somber but continued to listen to the second-graders read and soon was smiling again. He joked that they read so well, they must be sixth-graders."
The Post article is not cited in Hegseth’s paper.
Under Attack
The former Fox News host has been embroiled in controversies.
Hegseth has been finding himself under scrutiny since accepting the job. The former Fox News host faced an investigation after secret war plans were mistakenly leaked to a journalist who was inadvertently added to a text chain.
And last month, a former top aide to Hegseth said the secretary is more focused on staging photo ops than taking real action.
Colin Carroll, freshly fired as chief of staff to the deputy defense secretary, dropped bombshells on the Megyn Kelly podcast – claiming Hegseth was obsessed with hunting down leaks, wasting half his time on witch hunts instead of handling real defense business.
Carroll, who was let go during a leak investigation, explained: "He was very focused on the leaks, and I think it kind of consumed the team a little bit.
"If you look at a pie chart of the secretary's day, at this point, 50 percent of it is probably a leak investigation."
'Pentagon Princess' Pete
Never Miss an
Daily updates from the heart of Hollywood, right to your inbox
By entering your email and clicking Sign Up, you’re agreeing to let us send you customized marketing messages about us and our advertising partners. You are also agreeing to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
Hegseth been accused of vanity as well.
RadarOnline.com can reveal the concern over the photo ops could be warranted, especially since the defense secretary reportedly added a pricey makeup room right next to the Pentagon briefing zone so he could prep for TV appearances.
Two sources told CBS News the full-on glam suite ended up costing several thousand dollars, after the original renovation was pegged at over $40,000.
A Defense Department spokesperson said in a statement: "Changes and upgrades to the Pentagon Briefing Room are nothing new and routinely happen during changes in an administration."
However, the glam room and photo op chasing has earned Hegseth the nickname "Pentagon Princess" by his critics and political enemies.
