According to a White House official, there is no contemplation of dismissing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin by President Biden.
President Biden is not considering firing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin after he and other Pentagon officials
Was unable to inform about his admission to the hospital.
According to a White House official who spoke to CBS News, there have been ongoing visits to the White House for several days.
Last week, Lloyd was admitted to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center due to complications from a planned surgery. Even Mr. Biden was not made aware that Lloyd was in intensive care for several days. Although Austin is recovering, the Pentagon has not revealed any specifics about his condition.
The Department of Defense announced that Austin had a planned surgery on December 22 and was discharged the following day. However, on January 1, Austin encountered intense discomfort and was hospitalized in the ICU. He delegated certain responsibilities to his deputy, Kathleen Hicks, but neither…
She and the White House were not notified about his hospitalization at that moment..
According to Reuters, President Biden has no plans to remove Austin from his role as defense secretary.
A military official stated that General C.Q. Brown, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was informed of Austin’s hospitalization on January 2nd. However, as the president’s top military advisor, Brown did not relay this information to the White House.
During the weekend, it was announced that Austin had been hospitalized and had not informed the White House about his condition. Despite this, the White House maintains that the president has complete trust in Austin.
Austin has fully returned to his responsibilities.
However, he is receiving backlash from certain members of the Republican party in Congress for not disclosing his state. Representative Elise Stefanik, the chair of the GOP conference, demanded his resignation.
“It is alarming and completely unacceptable that the Department of Defense took several days to inform the president, the National Security Council, and the American people that Defense Secretary Austin was hospitalized and incapable of carrying out his responsibilities,” she stated.
This report was contributed to by Weijia Jiang and David Martin.
Kathryn Watson
Source: cbsnews.com