After a bruising weeklong confirmation process that took place mainly behind closed doors and under oath, Gen. John Hyten emerged largely unscathed, with his reputation intact, and his nomination to be the nation’s second-highest-ranking military officer appeared headed for Senate approval as early as this week.
Hyten had categorically denied the allegation that he sexually assaulted a more junior officer in her hotel room in 2017, when both attended the annual Reagan Security Forum in California, and was cleared by a team of 53 Air Force investigators.
But his nomination to become the next vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs was imperiled when a former military assistant went public with the explosive charges in the New York Times and then the Washington Post, giving both newspapers explicit accounts of the hotel room encounter.
The accuser, Army Col. Kathryn Spletstoser, told the New York Times she felt she had a moral obligation to come forward once she learned Hyten, her former boss, would not be retiring but was instead nominated for a new four-star assignment.
At his Tuesday Senate confirmation hearing, it was clear that after listening to both Hyten and Spletstoser behind closed doors over five days and reviewing voluminous evidence produced by an Air Force inspector general investigation, most senators believed Hyten’s insistence that “the allegations are false” and “nothing happened, ever.”
Hyten was helped by a strong endorsement from two women with a reputation for low tolerance of sexual assault in the military, former Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson and Arizona Republican Senator Martha McSally, an aviation pioneer who revealed earlier this year that she was raped as a young Air Force officer.
Wilson, who oversaw the investigation, told the Senate Armed Services Committee the allegations against Hyten were taken seriously and the probe was thorough and handled appropriately. In the end, she concluded the accuser’s story was not true.
“I accept that it is entirely possible that his accuser is a wounded soldier who believes what she is saying is true, even if it’s not. That possibility makes this whole situation very sad,” Wilson said.
“After all of this, I believe the Senate will come to the same conclusion I did: General Hyten was falsely accused, and this matter should be set aside as you consider his nomination.”
The hearing was notable for what did not happen.
Neither Elizabeth Warren nor Kirsten Gillibrand, both Democratic presidential candidates and sharp critics of the Pentagon’s handling of sexual assault allegations in the past, were present to question Hyten.
Warren was in Detroit for Tuesday night’s presidential primary debate on CNN.
Gillibrand is taking part in the second night of the debate Wednesday.
That left McSally in the role of the committee’s primary advocate for sexual assault victims, and she gave Hyten an unusually unequivocal judgment of vindication, saying the mountain of evidence was one-sided and compelling.
“To be clear, this wasn’t just a jump ball, not a ‘he said, she said,’ not a situation where we just couldn’t prove what allegedly happened,” McSally said.
“I, too, believe that truth still matters in this country and the full truth was revealed in this process. The truth is that General Hyten is innocent of these charges. Sexual assault happens in the military. It just didn’t happen in this case.”
Hyten’s situation in some ways resembled that of Judge Brett Kavanaugh after he was nominated to the Supreme Court last year, with some notable differences.
The accusations about Hyten were not fuzzy memories from decades earlier; they were from two years ago and recounted in unwavering detail.
And as the military officer in charge of America’s nuclear arsenal, Hyten could not afford to seem emotional or hysterical about the unfairness of the allegations against him.
Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine praised Hyten’s demeanor during the closed-door session, noting he never denigrated his accuser nor called the proceedings a witch hunt.
In the end, it might have been his job as U.S. strategic commander, who must be reachable in times of crisis, that saved him.
Hyten’s personal security detail, which he said has to have “eyes on him at all times,” was able to corroborate his statement that he never visited Spletstoser’s hotel room in 2017 or any other time.
A search of thousands of emails, text messages, and travel records, documented in a 1,400-page report, found no evidence to support Spletstoser’s allegations, and in fact confirmed many of the details of the account Hyten told investigators under oath.
That was enough to sway most members of the committee, including Chairman Jim Inhofe.
“This committee takes allegations of sexual assault very seriously. It is unacceptable,” he said. “But this committee will not act on unproven allegations, allegations that do not withstand the close scrutiny of the committee’s process.”
The Senate is expected to vote on Hyten’s nomination before Friday’s scheduled August recess.
