Several female Navy officers say they see Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's recent intervention in a promotions list as a sign their careers now have a ceiling.
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S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth delivers his address during the Shangri-La Dialogue, Asia's annual defense and security forum, in Singapore, Saturday, May 30, 2026. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine testifies at a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on defense hearing on the budget request for the Department of Defense, Tuesday, May 12, 2026, in Washington. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen.
Dan Caine arrive for a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on defense hearing on the budget request for the Department of Defense, Tuesday, May 12, 2026, in Washington. U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth delivers his address during the Shangri-La Dialogue, Asia's annual defense and security forum, in Singapore, Saturday, May 30, 2026.
cut nine Navy officers, including all the women, from a promotion list, several female officers say they see the unusual intervention as a sign that their careers now have a ceiling and worry for the The Navy had selected 31 sailors to promote from the rank of captain to one-star admiral, but Hegseth recently intervened to strike nine people from the list, including three women and two Black men, according to a defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss information not permitted to be released publicly.
As a result, the Navy is not promoting a single woman to the one-star admiral rank this year even though women make up about one-quarter of all Navy officers and nearly one-third of the sea service's midgrade ranks, according to military data from 2024. The Associated Press spoke with eight female Navy officers of varying ranks and time in service after Hegseth's cuts, which were reported earlier by The New York Times, became public.
They spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution from their superiors. The more junior officers said they saw the development as a sign that their careers would become politicized if they rose too far in the ranks, and some said they felt they now had a limit on how far they could be promoted. Some said it made them feel less valued within the military and wondered whether that wasn't part of the intent.
The Pentagon has not offered any rationale on why the women, or any of the other six people, were removed from the promotion list. Sean Parnell, the Pentagon's top spokesman, said on social media this week that “military promotions are given to those who have earned them” and that the Pentagon “will never consider the color of a service member’s skin or their gender as a factor in promotions.
" The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request seeking further comment. The Navy's process for choosing which officers to promote to the one-star rank has been relatively constant and transparent over the years. The service convenes a group of officers, called a promotion board, that examines the records of eligible officers and chooses the most qualified.
The board that selected the initial slate of 31 officers for promotion was directed by then-Navy Secretary John Phelan, an appointee of President Donald Trump, to “recommend for promotion the best qualified officers within their respective competitive category. ”in April, said the board should consider an officer's performance, competence and character, among other traits, as part of those qualifications.
, “special consideration shall be given to officers who have excelled in their knowledge of the political military affairs and U.S. strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific region, and operational contingency planning for Indo-Pacific war plans. ” "For too long, we’ve promoted too many uniformed leaders for the wrong reasons based on their race, based on gender quotas, based on historic so-called firsts,”Navy leaders and other top officials had approved promotion list Phelan's order said the Navy cannot discriminate based on criteria such as race and sex, and it specifically noted that “this guidance shall not be interpreted as requiring or permitting preferential treatment of any officer or group of officers on the grounds of race, religion, color, sex.
” The full list of 31 people to be promoted was approved by Phelan, other Navy leaders and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine, before it reached Hegseth, who chose to make the changes, the defense official said. While Hegseth is within his rights to intervene in the list, “it’s just not the norm,” said Katherine Kuzminski, a researcher specializing in military recruiting and retention at the Center for New American Security think tank.
Kuzminski noted that “this is a decision that’s not being made by the U.S. Navy — it’s being made by the secretary of defense” and said Hegseth's growing interference in operational aspects of the military services such as promotions is creating “tension" about what “normal” will look like going forward. Some of the more senior Navy officers who spoke with the AP expressed concerns about the message it sends to the next generation of young sailors.
Since then, he also has fired two other female three-star admirals without explanation. Some of the officers who spoke to the AP said that while they were encouraging female sailors to stick with the Navy, they acknowledged that message is coming at a difficult time. Kuzminski said the rhetoric and actions surrounding women in the military “affects individual service member decision-making and it also affects family unit decision-making,” including whether people make a career of the military.
In conversations with other sailors in her unit, she said that male sailors were hesitant to deal with what appears to be a growing politicization of simply following the orders of previous administrations. Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
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