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Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro blistered Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s command of the Iran War as if he’s “playing with toy soldiers” and condemned the way the Pentagon and White House are describing the military operation to the public.
Shapiro, who is running for reelection but is also seen as a 2028 Democratic presidential possibility, made the remarks on former Obama aide Jon Lovett’s podcast where he also said China is monitoring the Trump administration’s “weakness” as they carry out the Iran operation alongside Israel.
The Democrat said he is troubled with Hegseth’s management of the Department of War’s effort, noting that Pennsylvanians are part of the contingent involved in the Iran offensive.
“I also have a problem with the fact that the guy who is supposed to be in charge of this, Pete Hegseth, is wildly incompetent,” Shapiro said.
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“He’s like an eight-year-old playing with toy soldiers every day. His language is so f—ing offensive.”
Shapiro said the administration talks about the operation in a way that is disrespectful of the “humanity in the region” and of the American soldiers involved, which he added includes Pennsylvanians.
He said Congress had its chance to check Trump and Hegseth’s power but instead decided to be “wildly weak and pathetic souls” who gave away authority.
“You absolutely cannot trust Donald Trump to wage this war,” Shapiro said, adding that the administration’s messaging did not settle on a singular reason for attacking Iran.
“First he told us it was to go after their nuclear arsenal … then he said we went to war because if we didn’t, Israel was going to strike first [and] Israel forced our hand … then it was regime change, and now we’re left with the son [of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] who seemingly could be more dangerous than the father.”
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Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, left; Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, right. (Peter W. Stevenson/Getty Images; Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images) (Copyright goes here)
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Shapiro said the Iranian regime is, however, everything that critics say it is, and that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is a “bad guy” who oversaw the largest export of terrorism worldwide while chanting “Death To America” for decades.
“These are bad people — it shouldn’t be hard to say that.”
But Shapiro said Trump “never once looked the American people in the eye, sitting in the Oval Office — where he should’ve been, not his swim club in Florida — and said to the American people ‘This is why we have to do this, this is the imminent threat’ — of which we’ve learned there is no imminent threat.”
Shapiro said America’s enemies are watching the war and seeing weakness instead of strength.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth speaks at the Shield of the Americas Summit in Miami, Florida, on March 7, 2026. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
“President Xi in China, who is calculating every day about when he is going to make his move on Taiwan, saw the president of the United States not only not be able to rally the world around this cause … but couldn’t even rally his own people.”
He noted that while he has criticisms of former President George W. Bush‘s War on Terror, the Texas Republican properly rallied the public to the cause.
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Shapiro, who is Jewish, has also often broken with his own party over antisemitic displays from the far left amid the unrest in the Middle East — including condemnation of harassment of Jewish students at the University of Pennsylvania in West Philadelphia.
When asked about Shapiro’s comments, White House spokesperson Olivia Wales said that for 50 years, presidents of both parties have talked about eliminating the Iranian threat to the American people, but that Trump is the only one with the “courage to confront it.”
“President Trump has been clear about the goals of this operation: destroy the Iranian regime’s ballistic missile and production capacity, annihilate the Iranian regime’s Navy, end their ability to arm proxies, and guarantee that Iran can never obtain a nuclear weapon,” she said as Shapiro questioned the administration’s goals.
“Democrats will flip-flop on anything – even carrying water for a nation that chants ‘Death to America’ – in order to attack President Trump, but the President and his administration will always protect our Nation and put the American people first,” Wales added.
Fox News Digital reached out to the Pentagon for comment.