A Republican member of the Senate Armed Services Committee said he plans to oppose the nomination of a controversial Trump-backed Pentagon official unless the Defense Department makes “significant changes” to its bureaucratic policies, including ending its opposition to the USS Frank E. Evans Act.
Sen. Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, often a reliable Trump ally in the Senate, said he had met on Tuesday with Anthony Tata, a Pentagon adviser nominated by the president for the No. 3 spot at the Defense Department, and warned he would oppose Tata’s nomination unless something is done about the “firm hold” that the bureaucracy has on the Pentagon. That includes the Defense Department’s opposition to adding the names of “the Lost 74” to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Tata himself has come under fire in recent weeks for controversial comments he made online, for which he has since apologized.
“When I spoke with Anthony Tata about his nomination today, I reiterated my frustration with the bureaucracy and its firm hold on the Defense Department. A prime example I addressed is an issue I spoke to Defense Secretary Esper about last month: the Department’s long-standing opposition to adding the sailors who died about the USS Frank E. Evans to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, a policy based on arbitrary Defense Department guidelines enforced by unelected bureaucrats,” Cramer said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “If the Department does not make significant changes to their policy, I plan to oppose Tata’s nomination. I hope to hear some positive news at his hearing this week.”
There are 27 members on the panel, 14 of whom are Republicans. If Cramer’s opposition to the nomination continues, it could throw a wrench in the confirmation process for Tata.
Tata is a retired brigadier general of the U.S. Army, serving from 1981 through 2009, including combat tours in Afghanistan. He retired after the Army found that he had committed adultery, which is a violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Tata went on to become North Carolina’s secretary of transportation and was a regular on Fox News. He is also the author of the popular Threat thriller series, the profits of which benefit the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Tata is currently a senior adviser to Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and on June 10 was nominated to become the undersecretary of defense for policy, the third-most senior role at the Pentagon, which would give him oversight of a host of defense issues.
The USS Frank E. Evans, a naval destroyer that had just completed a combat tour off Vietnam’s coast and was scheduled to return, sank during a training exercise in June 1969. Seventy-four sailors drowned, and only one body was recovered. For decades, survivors and families have fought to add the names of the perished sailors to the iconic granite wall in Washington, but the Pentagon opposes the effort because the incident occurred more than 100 miles outside the designated Vietnam War theater. Earlier this year, Cramer tried to pass by unanimous consent on the Senate floor a motion that would add “the Lost 74” to the Vietnam war memorial, but Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska objected, citing the Pentagon’s opposition.
That opposition could now further complicate Tata’s nomination, where he must clear a nomination hearing by the Armed Services Committee.
Tata has come under fire in recent weeks for a host of controversial statements, including tweets from July 2018 that have since been deleted but were archived by CNN. In the tweets, Tata said that former President Barack Obama is “a Muslim” and a “terrorist leader” who “made no secret of his belief that a weaker America made for a stronger world.” Tata said that Obama did more to “help Islamic countries than any president in history” and described Islam as the “most oppressive violent religion I know of.”
Among other things, Tata also suggested in a May 2018 tweet that former CIA Director John Brennan made a “clear threat” of assassination against President Trump when the Obama-era spy chief quoted Cicero in a tweet. Tata tweeted that Brennan should be “arrested immediately.”
Tata apologized in June, sending a letter to Armed Services Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma and ranking Democrat Jack Reed of Rhode Island saying that he “deeply regretted” the comments.
“Out of the 8,800 tweets I authored and hundreds of speeches I have given, the few misstatements on Twitter, while grievous, are not indicative of who I am,” Tata wrote. “They are an aberration in a four-decade thread of faithful public service.”
Tata added: “My regret, however, has nothing to do with my nomination for Undersecretary of Defense of Policy. Rather, I have a lifetime of public service leadership and a cadre of soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and civilian mentors and protégés whom I disappointed with those comments.”
In his letter, Tata admitted there was no excuse for his “hyperbolic conversations” but said his military career spent in Bosnia, North Macedonia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan helping Muslims stay safe from terrorists showed that he valued people of other faiths.
The White House previously stood by Tata’s nomination.
“Anthony Tata, the president’s exceptionally qualified nominee for Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, is a distinguished public servant whose career has provided him with planning, policy, and operational experience both at home and abroad,” said White House spokesman Judd Deere. “His education, background, and record has earned him bipartisan praise, and the Senate should not delay his confirmation.”
Cramer, who has pushed for the bipartisan USS Frank E. Evans Act first as a congressman and now as a freshman senator, has repeatedly expressed his frustration with the Pentagon’s opposition.
“The Defense Department has a mixed, if not negative, record with regards to honoring the names of those who died in the sinking of the USS Frank E. Evans by adding them to the Vietnam memorial wall,” Cramer told the Washington Examiner earlier this year. “Bureaucrats and middlemen have stood in the way, offering excuses each time.”
