Pete Hegseth, the nominee to lead the Defense Department in the next administration, claims the military watered down its fitness requirements to accommodate a directive to allow women to serve in the most physically demanding roles.
"The standards have been lowered," Hegseth said during a Nov. 7 interview on the Sean Ryan Show. "I'm straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles."
But the military has said it did not lower qualification requirements for women to serve in some of the toughest jobs on the battlefield.
Although women have long fought in combat, the Department of Defense officially opened those roles to women in 2016.
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Ash Carter, the defense secretary at the time, said women would still have to prove they could handle the grueling physical demands.
"As long as they qualify and meet the standards, women will now be able to contribute to our mission in ways they could not before," Carter said during a news conference in 2015. "They'll be allowed to drive tanks, fire mortars and lead infantry soldiers into combat."
In 2022, the Army lowered general physical standards for women and older troops — female and male — but that only applies to the annual physical fitness exam.
The Army and all of the branches still require women to pass strict fitness tests if they want to take on the most physically challenging specialty jobs, like an Army Ranger or Green Beret.
While only a small number of women have been able to meet the rigorous physical requirements to join those elite ranks, there are now thousands of women serving in positions that were male-only until nine years ago.
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Before that, many fought in the intense battles of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Illinois, who flew combat missions in Iraq, says keeping women from the most intense warfare is impractical given the nature of war in the 21st century.
"This idea that you can exclude women from combat is one that really shows (Hegseth's) lack of experience," Duckworth said. "Let's be real, in modern warfare there is no forward line of troops like you had, where you could keep women."
When Duckworth and other senators consider Hegseth's nomination during confirmation hearings, they are likely to press him on what actions, if any, he would take as defense secretary to try to remove women from combat roles.
