Senate panel scraps confirmation hearing for controversial Pentagon nominee at last minute
The confirmation hearing for President Trump's controversial nominee to lead the Pentagon's policy shop was canceled less than an hour before it was set to begin on Thursday.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) said the hearing was canceled because "many" Democrats and Republicans "didn't know enough about Anthony Tata to consider him for a very significant position at this time."
"We didn't get the required documentation in time; some documents, which we normally get before a hearing, didn't arrive until yesterday," Inhofe said in a statement released about 15 minutes before the hearing had been scheduled to start. "As I told the president last night, we're simply out of time with the August recess coming, so it wouldn't serve any useful purpose to have a hearing at this point, and he agreed."
Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), the ranking member of the committee, said in his own statement senators in both parties had "serious questions" about Tata.
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Democrats have been calling for Tata, a retired Army brigadier general most known for his frequent guest appearances on Fox News, to withdraw from consideration as under secretary of Defense for policy since inflammatory and racist tweets were surfaced by CNN last month.
In 2018 tweets, for example, Tata called Obama a "terrorist leader" and said Islam is the "most oppressive violent religion I know of." He also called Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) a "vicious race baiting racist" and said she and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) "have always been the same violent extremists."
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