Let me tell you something. When one of my kids comes to me and says “Mom, so-and-so took my phone and I don’t know why,” my first question is always the same. Did anybody bother to ask you about it first? Did anybody explain what you supposedly did? And if the answer to both of those is no, then we have a problem in this house.
That’s exactly what happened to Frank Kendall, except instead of a phone, they took his security clearance. And instead of a teacher, it was Pete Hegseth. And nobody. Asked. Him. Anything.
Kendall is 77 years old. He ran the Air Force. He supervised the actual Air Force One modernization program. He spent decades in national security. And he found out his clearance was gone because Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell posted about it on X. A tweet. They told the internet before they told the man.
Now here’s where I need somebody to explain it to me like I’m five. The Pentagon says Kendall leaked classified information about the new Air Force One, that $400 million plane Qatar gave Donald Trump. Kendall says he didn’t. He told CNN’s Erin Burnett he was “mystified” because he tried very hard not to say anything classified. And when the Wall Street Journal asked him what he supposedly revealed, he said nobody has told him. To this day. They stripped his clearance and won’t even say what he did wrong.
U.S. Air Force (Public domain) via Wikimedia CommonsDoes that sound like justice to you? Because in my house, that’s called making it up as you go.
Here’s what Kendall actually said, out loud, to the New York Times. He said the plane was missing security features because there wasn’t enough time to do the normal modifications. He said it had “a lot of shortfalls” compared to the real Air Force One. He said he was “surprised to see this plane used outside the U.S.” during a conflict with Iran.
That’s it. That’s the leak. A man who knows airplanes looked at an airplane and said, basically, this one isn’t ready yet.
And you know what’s wild? He was right. Trump flew that plane to a NATO summit in Turkey and then quietly switched to the older Air Force One for the trip home. The Secret Service told him to. The plane doesn’t have advanced anti-missile capabilities. The Washington Post reported Trump was sneaked off the plane via a catering truck after intelligence flagged a possible Iranian assassination threat. But sure, let’s punish the guy who said out loud what everybody already knew.
And Pete Hegseth is the one lecturing us about “safeguarding classified information.” Pete Hegseth. The same Pete Hegseth who had his own issues handling sensitive material. That’s like my teenager lecturing the younger ones about screen time. The audacity is breathtaking.
U.S. Department of Defense (Public domain) via Wikimedia CommonsKendall hired attorney Mark Zaid, who handles these cases, and he’s suing. Good. He told CNN, “As my mother taught me years ago, you stand up to bullies.” His mother was right. Mine said the same thing.
Kendall also said this is one of over a hundred cases where the government has yanked clearances with no process, no notice, no chance to respond. Over a hundred. That’s not a policy. That’s a pattern.
The administration even subpoenaed New York Times reporters who covered the plane’s problems. Federal agents showed up at their homes. The subpoenas were later withdrawn, but the message was clear: stop asking questions about the president’s fancy new jet.
I’ve got four kids and a group chat full of moms who ask more questions before a playdate than this Pentagon asked before revoking a career official’s clearance. And we’re the ones they call conspiracy theorists for noticing.
Acroterion (CC BY-SA 4.0) via Wikimedia CommonsKendall said it best. He doesn’t even know what they think he said. Nobody from the government ever talked to him. No questions, no hearing, no chance to defend himself. Just a tweet from Sean Parnell and a clearance gone.
If that can happen to a former Air Force secretary, it can happen to anybody. And that’s the part that should keep you up at night.