Fact Check: Did Pete Hegseth Call Putin a ‘War Criminal?’

President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet appointments have brought Fox News and former National Guard officer Pete Hegseth into the White House as his secretary of defense, a move described as “beyond stupid.”
Trump announced Hegseth’s selection in a social media post on Tuesday evening. The president-elect said: “Pete has spent his entire life as a Warrior for the Troops, and for the Country. Pete is tough, smart and a true believer in America First.”
With Trump claiming he could end the war in Ukraine in one day, and with many in the right of the Republican Party critical of U.S. spending on the conflict, claims appeared on social media repeating comments Hegseth had made criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin in bold terms.
The Claim
A post on X, formerly Twitter, by Adam Lowisz on November 13, 2024, viewed 46,000 times said: “Pete Hegseth calls Putin a war criminal and says Biden has been a weak president.
“We should have sent Ukraine double the weapons and faster so this war would be over sooner with a victory for Ukraine.
“Trump made an amazing choice for the Department of defense!@PeteHegseth”
The interview included a clip from Fox News in which Hegseth said: “When it comes to Ukraine though… he’s [Putin] going to double down on the tactics he believes will bring civilians to their knees.
“You know why? He doesn’t play by the rules of war. We call him a war criminal and we do, and rightfully so. He doesn’t care.
“Russia is not a signatory to the International Criminal Court. He doesn’t feel any threat that he’ll be held accountable.
“Ceasefires? You know what ceasefires are for him? An opportunity to reload. An opportunity to pick more targets and he’s already said…this is a precarious part for Zelensky, too. Zelensky did the right thing in saying, ‘Hey, any man in this country, stay here, pick up the rifle and fight.’
“But in the twisted mind of Vladimir Putin, you know what that says? Every man in the country who was a civilian is now a military target. That means any civilian target could be a military target and women and children that are there are human shields for the men who are carrying Kalashnikovs. Think about it through the psychology of him.”
The Facts
While Hegseth aligned with the claim that Putin was a “war criminal,” the clip shared online was from March 2022 not long after the outbreak of the conflict.
Since then Hegseth has been more cautious, and critical of the U.S. intervention in Ukraine and the prognosis from others that Russia’s intervention would lead to wider conflict.
In an episode of the Shawn Ryan Show Podcast from November 2024, Hegseth said he did not see Putin taking the world into a wider global or nuclear conflict, saying his gains would be incremental, part of what he called a “get my s*** back” conflict.
“I found it overinflated from the beginning this idea that Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine was going to lead to nuclear war or war across the continent,” Hegseth said.
“I’ve always felt like it was from the beginning, like a couple days in, I like, this feels like the Putin’s ‘give me my s*** back’ war.
“It kind of feels like [Putin thought] ‘I feel like you’ve been pushing pretty hard, and we used to have the former Soviet Union, and we’re pretty proud of that, and Ukraine was a part of it, and all these other… I want my s*** back, and I think I’m at the right time where I’m powerful enough to do it, and you’re not quite on my border yet, and Biden’s AWOL, so I’m going for it. Just like I did under my minor incursion under Obama. I got what I could I got Crimea now I waited under Trump, now I’m going to get my…’
“And this idea that I hear all the time and I’ve friends who would probably agree with us on most things they’re like ‘Well if you don’t stop him in Ukraine, then he’s going to go all the way to Poland.’
“I don’t think he’s, I mean, maybe in a perfect world where he had unlimited capabilities and he could crown himself king of Europe, he would. I think he probably knows enough to know that it’s probably not going much further than Ukraine.
“And I don’t think he’s a suicidal maniac who’s hell-bent on bringing in armageddon with nuclear warfare.”
Elsewhere, he has also defended Trump’s comment in 2022 calling Putin “very savvy” after the Russian president announced Moscow’s recognition of the independence of two self-proclaimed republics in eastern Ukraine.
While the White House and the EU described Putin’s actions as a violation of international law and a pretext for an invasion, Trump said Putin’s move was “genius” and “very savvy.”
Hegseth defended the comments saying that Trump was trying to tease the media for obsessing over the Russian leader
“Here’s the reality, Vladimir Putin lives rent-free in the minds of our media, of the American media,” Hegseth said.
“No organism, no entity has done more to spread Russian propaganda and to prop up the strawman that is Vladimir Putin than our very own media.”
In a Fox News interview in February 2023 with South Carolina Republican Representative Nancy Mace, Hegseth criticized the number of times President Joe Biden had visited Ukraine compared to the southern border of the U.S., and the “billions spent in Ukraine” suggesting he was ignoring “our problems at home.”
He also asked “what do we get out of” the billions the U.S. has committed to Ukraine, to which Mace reminded him that the U.S., Russia, and the United Kingdom signed security assurances in 1994 that guaranteed Ukraine’s sovereignty in exchange for the Kyiv’s agreement to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, making it a non-nuclear-weapon state.
While this background doesn’t alter what Hegseth has previously said, his comments since suggest that his priorities toward Ukraine and attitude toward Putin and Russia may have changed. At the very least, the clip does not give a full picture of Hegseth’s attitude toward the conflict.
The Ruling
Needs Context.
Pete Hegseth did say Russian President Vladimir Putin was a “war criminal” during a broadcast on Fox News in March 2022, near the start of the invasion. He has also defended Trump’s comments calling Putin “very savvy” and “genius,” questioned U.S. spending supporting Ukraine, and downplayed Putin’s aggression.
FACT CHECK BY Newsweek’s Fact Check team