from WNYC Studios. I'm Brian Lerer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Tuesday, January 14th.

Today, something a little different on our podcast. We're bringing you a key excerpt from the confirmation hearing today for

President-elect Trump's nominee for Defense Secretary Pete Hegsef. By way of background,

Hegsteth is highly controversial for a number of reasons. They range from his personal conduct with

women, to his writing that moms shouldn't serve in the military, to his lack of

experience running large organizations, to his prediction of a civil war in 2020 if Joe Biden

were to be elected president, a civil war in which he said the military would have to take sides.

The excerpt we chose runs about 15 minutes. It's the questioning by one of the

most conservative members of the Senate, Republican Tom Cotton, from Arkansas, followed by the next

Senator up, Democrat, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York. And then we'll have a few minutes of analysis with

Karen Greenberg from the Fordham University Law School. But again, this starts with Senator Cotton.

Mr. Hexsett, let's continue on this line of questioning about what sometimes referred to as

women in combat.

I think that phrase is something of a misnomer.

Many members of this committee have served in combat in the last 25 years to include women and men. I'm sure all those

men served with women, whether they were military police officers or they were pilots or whether

they were intelligence analysts or medics or what have you. You served. I assume you served with women

who were on the front lines as well. Is that correct?

And were those women anything other than skill, brave, and honorable in their service?

They were some of the best soldiers I worked with.

So women have been serving in combat for a long time.

Women have been serving in combat units like infantry battalions for a long time,

...