Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), the ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee, believes President Joe Biden should at least consider removing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin after the top defense official let days go by without notifying the administration that he had been hospitalized.
In an interview with CNN on Tuesday evening, Mr. Smith called the defense secretary’s multi-day delay in notifying the Biden administration and Congress of his hospitalization “very troubling.”
Mr. Austin underwent an elective medical procedure on Dec. 22 and was discharged the following day. Mr. Austin began experiencing severe pain on Jan. 1 and was admitted to an intensive care unit at the Walter Reed Military Medical Center. According to a timeline provided by Pentagon Press Secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, Mr. Austin’s chief of staff notified the deputy secretary of defense and the White House national security adviser of his hospitalization on the afternoon of Jan. 4. Members of Congress weren’t notified of the situation until the afternoon of Jan. 5.
In a Tuesday update, the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center announced that Mr. Austin had been diagnosed with prostate cancer and that his Dec. 22 medical procedure was a surgical procedure to “treat and cure” his cancer.
“There’s really no excuse that I can think of, for not having informed the President, number one, that you had cancer, but certainly number two, that he was having the surgery, and that he was hospitalized. And that’s the one question that we have to have answered. What did Secretary Austin think? I mean, why did he think that it was okay not to tell the President?” Mr. Smith said.
The top House Armed Services Committee Democrat said he can’t imagine an explanation that would justify Mr. Austin’s delay in notifying President Biden.
When asked if President Biden should consider firing his defense secretary, Mr. Smith said, “They’ve got to have that conversation. I don’t know. Like I said, at the moment, I can’t think of a plausible explanation.”
Several Republican politicians have called for Mr. Austin’s resignation or firing. Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.) is also advancing an effort to impeach Mr. Austin. For now, the White House has indicated President Biden is not seeking the defense secretary’s removal.
Mr. Smith’s comments could raise the pressure within President Biden’s own party to address the hospitalization controversy.
Smith Says Removal Issue Could Be Politicized
While Mr. Smith said President Biden should consider removing Mr. Austin, he warned that the process would not also be without some political risks for Democrats going into an election year.
“I do also want to say that the Republicans, I mean they’re going to make hay out of this,” Mr. Smith told CNN.
Mr. Smith said he would hope to avoid the issue becoming politicized “but I think in the short-term we’re going to need to hear from the President, what was the explanation he got from Secretary Austin? Is he satisfied with that?”
Though he called for answers about the undisclosed hospitalization, Mr. Smith said he believed Mr. Austin has “done a great job” throughout his time as the secretary of defense, including by organizing allies and partners in response to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and for overseeing the U.S. response following the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas. He said Mr. Austin could be difficult to replace if President Biden does seek his removal.
“As far as the resignation talk is concerned, we also have to factor in that the Republicans are trying to gum up whatever the President does, and we probably wouldn’t be able to appoint a new Secretary of Defense. All of those things need to be factored in here,” Mr. Smith said. “But that’s a conversation the president and the secretary need to have. And the president needs to be confident in his secretary of defense.”
Former president and 2024 Republican frontrunner Donald Trump said in a post on his Truth social media account on Sunday that Mr. Austin “should have been dismissed long ago” for a variety of reasons, but in particular for his handling of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.
While announcing his efforts to pursue an impeachment, Mr. Rosendale similarly presented Mr. Austin’s undisclosed hospitalization as part of a pattern of conduct that jeopardizes national security, including his handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal and alleged dishonesty regarding an incident last year in which a Chinese high altitude surveillance balloon floated across the entire continental United States before it was eventually shot down.
In her own calls for Mr. Austin’s resignation, House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) tied his period of undisclosed hospitalization to more recent concerns in the Middle East, with the ongoing Israel-Hamas war and recent attacks targeting U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria.
During Mr. Austin’s period of undisclosed hospitalization, U.S. forces have had to contend with new Houthi attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea, including the detonation of an explosive-laden unmanned surface vessel near commercial ships on Jan. 4. On the day Mr. Austin was hospitalized, Iran also deployed a warship in the Red Sea, raising the risk of a confrontation with U.S. forces operating in the waterway.
On Jan. 4, still hours before the White House national security adviser was notified of Mr. Austin’s hospitalization, the United States carried out a drone strike on an alleged Iran-linked terrorist target in Iraq that the U.S. Department of Defense said was actively involved in planning and carrying out attacks against American personnel. The U.S. strike in Iraq elicited pushback from officials within the Iraqi government, who argued that the strike undermined Iraqi sovereignty and the military cooperation agreement it has with U.S. forces operating in the country.