Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has been called to testify before the House Armed Services in February.
Austin and the Defense Department initially failed to disclose the 70-year-old's hospitalization in early January, raising questions about the state and security of the department. The aide to Austin who called for the ambulance on Jan. 1 reportedly asked that lights and sirens not be used while transporting the defense secretary to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. Austin ultimately spent two weeks in the hospital and has since revealed he has prostate cancer.
Congressman Mike Rogers of Alabama, the House Armed Services Committee chairman, sent a letter to Austin on Jan. 18 seeking information about his department’s decision not to inform the Biden administration or Pentagon leadership about his hospitalization. Rogers indicated that Austin had promised him in a recent conversation to be fully transparent about the incident but that “a concerning number of questions were not addressed.”
“Specifically, I am alarmed you refused to answer whether you instructed your staff not to inform the President of the United States or anyone else of your hospitalization,” wrote Rogers. “Unfortunately, this leads me to believe that information is being withheld from Congress. Congress must understand what happened and who made decisions to prevent the disclosure of the whereabouts of a cabinet secretary.”
He asked Austin to appear before the full committee on Feb. 14 and to provide “direct testimony” regarding the decision to hide his location and condition.
“I expect your full honesty and cooperation in this matter,” the congressman wrote. “Anything short of that is completely unacceptable.”
Rogers included a list of questions that the defense secretary has not addressed. The Republican has asked for a “detailed account of [his] actions and intent in transferring [his] duties to [Deputy Secretary Kathleen Hicks] and the context conveyed to her about the reason for the transfer of duties” as well as an account “of all official actions taken or approved” by Austin during the hospitalization. He has also asked for “a record of all other periods where any other person assumed the duties of Secretary of Defense that coincided with medical procedures or other medical activities rendering [Austin] unable to perform such duties.”
Hicks has also received a letter from the committee chairman inquiring about her knowledge of Austin’s hospitalization and her actions during that time.
According to a report from CBS News, Hicks did not know that Austin had been taken to the hospital when she assumed his duties on Jan. 2. The deputy secretary, who was in Puerto Rico on vacation at the time, was informed on Jan. 4 and returned to the United States on Jan. 6. Major General Pat Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary, said during a press conference that Hicks made “some routine operational and management decisions” and that the transfer “occurs from time to time and is not tied chiefly to health related matters.”
“The Deputy Secretary keeps a complete suite of communications and capable staff with her at all times, regardless of geographic location,” Ryder stated.
