The Defence Secretary of the United States of America, Pete Hegseth, has pushed out Army Chief of Staff General Randy George along with two other high-profile Generals on the same day as the administration continues to reshape key institutions around its priorities.

 

President Donald Trump also announced on Truth social that Attorney General Pam Bondi was resigning, naming Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche as interim head of the Justice Department. Blanche is a former personal lawyer to Trump and one of the few figures who has maintained a consistently close relationship with the US president across both his terms.

 

News reports have said that Trump was growing increasingly frustrated with Bondi on two fronts. The first was her handling of files related to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Trump allies and some Republican lawmakers accused Bondi of mismanaging or covering up the release of the documents, and the criticism had come to define much of her time in office. 

 

According to reports, the second was her failure to move fast enough on prosecutions of individuals Trump wanted to see face criminal charges — critics, adversaries, and others the president had publicly taken aim at.

 

In his post announcing the decision, Trump called Bondi a "loyal friend" who had presided over what he described as a significant crackdown on crime, and said that she would be moving to a role in the private sector. 

 

Bondi, responding, said that leading Trump's public safety agenda had been "the honor of a lifetime" and that she would spend the next month helping Blanche transition into the role. Blanche, for his part, promised that the department would do everything in its power to keep the country safe.

 

On the military side, Hegseth asked General George to step down with immediate effect on the same day. Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell confirmed the departure in a statement posted on X, saying that George "will be retiring from his position", but offered no explanation, especially at a time when the US is engaged in conflict alongside Israel against Iran.

 

Another international media outlet, which first reported the firing, cited a source that said that Hegseth wanted someone in the post who would implement his and Trump's vision for the army. George, 61, was appointed to the role in 2023 under former President Joe Biden. 

 

He had served in multiple overseas postings including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and as chief of staff had worked to cut redundancies within the army and bring in newer technologies, including low-cost missile interceptor drones and AI-assisted targeting systems.

 

Two other officials were dismissed the same day: General David Hodne, who led the Army's Transformation and Training Command, a unit focused on modernising military capabilities, and Major General William Green Jr, the army's chief of chaplains. Neither removal was confirmed by the Pentagon.