As any Hallmark anniversary card value its salt can let you know, a spouse is commonly many issues to her partner: Lover, buddy, teammate, and many others. Within the case of Jennifer Rauchet, Secretary of Protection Pete Hegseth’s third spouse, we will add “former producer, former coworker, meeting-with-heads-of-state buddy, and reported recipient of categorised navy info through Sign chat” to the record, too. You may by no means actually know one other individual’s marriage, proper?
Hegseth has reportedly discovered a strategy to mix his standing as a serial Spouse Man together with his ardour for group chats, together with Rauchet in addition to his brother, podcast producer Philip Hegseth, in one other Sign chat accessible on private gadgets and discussing navy assault plans. He has additionally toted Rauchet and Child Bro (now a Pentagon worker!) alongside to high-level nationwide safety conferences on the Pentagon and overseas, the Wall Street Journal reported. Hegseth is an actual household man. (Hegseth’s private lawyer was additionally a part of the newest Sign chat revelation, according to the New York Times. While you’ve been accused of as a lot wrongdoing as Hegseth has, nevertheless, it is smart that your lawyer would fall into the Dom Toretto “I don’t bought mates, I bought household” class.)
Regardless of popping up in fairly high-profile conferences, Rauchet, 45, has saved a comparatively low profile on the general public stage. She met Hegseth within the hallowed halls of Fox Information, the place she was employed from 2006, an government producer for the community till not too long ago, and Hegseth was a Fox & Pals weekend anchor from 2017 to 2024 after time as a contributor and visitor. They grew to become extra than simply colleagues, nevertheless, when Hegseth was nonetheless married to his second spouse, Samantha Deering, with whom he shares three sons. In August 2017 Rauchet gave delivery to a child lady fathered by Hegseth. In September 2017, Deering filed for divorce. Rauchet, too, was married at the time. In response to earlier stories, Rauchet was reassigned from Fox & Pals to Watters’ World after they disclosed their relationship.
Rauchet and Hegseth got married in August 2019 at Trump National Golf Club in Colts Neck, New Jersey, a ceremony attended by Donald Trump and that includes customized “Make Marriage Nice Once more” ballcaps. (It additionally served as one thing of a comfortable launch for fellow Fox Information couple Sean Hannity and Ainsley Earhardt, who arrived on the occasion collectively in a helicopter.) Rauchet additionally has three kids from earlier relationships, bringing the couple’s mixed brood to seven. The whole crew was present for Hegseth’s swearing-in ceremony in January after a contentious affirmation listening to and a tie-breaking vote forged by JD Vance, Rauchet pink-clad and smiling as she held the Bible for her husband.
Whereas the 2 have been nonetheless at Fox, rumors circulated that Rauchet lavished Hegseth with extra airtime than different contributors, and Hegseth in April 2023 angrily shot down rumors on social media that his “superb spouse” had had something to do with the ouster of fellow Fox fam Tucker Carlson. “Fakest information I’ve ever heard,” he wrote.
Rauchet often seems on Hegseth’s Instagram grid, the place he has referred to her greater than as soon as as his “rock.” Per Rauchet’s personal Instagram, Hegseth is her “cowboy.” Oh.
Rauchet has additionally scored a few extra-special IMDb credits out of the union: She has a number of listings in Fox archival footage as “Pete’s spouse.”
She doesn’t seem to carry any official place within the authorities, nor has any safety clearance she holds been disclosed. Hegseth’s little brother Phil, nevertheless, has been hired as an advisor within the Division of Homeland Safety on the Pentagon. Pesky anti-nepotism law bars public officers from hiring shut relations, with brothers showing as one of many particularly named relations, possible making a gig in Protection itself off-limits. However think about: With out that function, how else is Phil purported to hang out with Conor McGregor?
Contacted for remark by Vainness Truthful, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell shared a press release that he also posted on X (previously Twitter), studying partially, “There was no categorised info in any Sign chat, irrespective of what number of methods they attempt to write the story. What’s true is that the Workplace of the Secretary of Protection is constant to turn into stronger and extra environment friendly in executing President Trump’s agenda.”
Maybe Signalgate 2.0 is an instance of Hegseth having a novel tackle these Republican “household values,” the identical ones which have led him to repeated infidelity and two divorces. It could possibly be that he’s so used to being prepped and produced by Rauchet for TV that he can’t dangle in his new place with out somebody to maintain monitor of his schedule, background studying, and pressed anti-shine powder. Or perhaps he simply wished to present Rauchet some Cap Hill water cooler chat fodder—she and SLOTUS Usha Vance can bond over their husbands texting them for his or her ideas on international coverage and issues of nationwide significance.
