Just over one month after his landmark meeting with the military’s top brass, War Secretary Pete Hegseth delivered an explanation for his crusade against the “beardos” who did not adhere to the military’s personal grooming standards. Hegseth, who mentioned the “beardos” in his speech to the gathered military leaders in late September, said on Wednesday that he was referencing the rapidly growing number of men at the Pentagon who had claimed affiliation with the Nordic Pagan or Old Norse religion in an apparent attempt to skirt the military’s shaving regulations. WATCH: ?WATCH: @SecWar goes NUCLEAR on ‘beardos’: “Do you know how many troops claim to be Nordic pagan?” https://t.co/AYUKc6zJbr pic.twitter.com/eQnss2q0Sn — Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) November 12, 2025 “I also said we don’t need to be a military of beardos anymore,” Hegseth said. “Do you know how many troops claim to be Nordic Pagan?” Over laughter from around the room, he continued, “No, suddenly it’s become this real religious, fake religious affiliation inside the Pentagon where troops claim to be Nordic Pagan so they can grow a beard — and no one challenges them on it because no one has upheld standards for a long time. So now a quarter of the platoon is sporting beards because they’re now suddenly Nordic Pagans. We’re not doing that stuff anymore.” “There will be some people that say, well, Pete, why would a secretary care about beards and PT standards?” he added. “When you let the small things go inside your formations, you create a climate of a lack of discipline, where standards cannot be enforced. If you can’t enforce them on the small things, it gets far more difficult to enforce them on even more meaningful things … the entire command structure is flipped upside down.” While many men who practice the Nordic Pagan religion do grow beards in order to honor specific gods or simply to express masculinity and status, they are not required to. Military men are expected to keep their faces clean-shaven both for the uniform appearance and because the issued protective masks — designed to protect service members in the event of a gas attack — may not seal properly if the wearer’s face is not smooth.

A conservative group announced Wednesday that it plans to spend tens of millions of dollars to help maintain pro-life majorities in Congress. Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America and its partner political action committee, Women Speak Out, will spend $80 million to fund canvassing, digital advertising, voter contact mail, and early voting campaigns in key Senate and House races across the country. The group said it hopes to make at least 4.5 million visits across the country with a focus on battleground races in Iowa, Georgia, Michigan, and North Carolina.  “Republicans simply cannot win without their pro-life base, especially in midterm elections when overall turnout drops. Pro-life voters are the heart and soul of the Republican Party,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of SBA Pro-Life America. “Our mission is to fire up pro-life Americans who do not consistently vote in midterms and convince persuadable voters to reject the Democrats’ extreme all-trimester abortion agenda.” Pro-life voters were a significant part of the coalition that helped President Donald Trump win his surprising victory in 2016 after he promised to appoint Supreme Court justices who would overturn Roe v. Wade.  During the 2024 presidential election, SBA Pro-Life America said it contacted 10 million voters across eight battleground states.  Sen. Tim Sheehy, a Republican who defeated incumbent Democrat Jon Tester in Montana last year, praised SBA’s efforts to support his campaign. “SBA was there from the beginning,” he said. “They knocked over 100,000 doors in our state with 600,000 voters. That’s a massive amount. And the most important thing they did was shatter the narrative that we were somehow radicals because we wanted to protect the lives of unborn children.” As a result of the election victories in 2024, Republicans in Congress were able to defund Planned Parenthood for a year in Trump’s signature “Big, Beautiful Bill.” In recent years, Democrats have also campaigned heavily on abortion. Before the 2022 midterm elections, many Democratic candidates focused their messaging on the overturning of Roe. Former Vice President Kamala Harris embraced the same strategy during her presidential run last year and urged the Senate to overturn the filibuster to pass laws codifying a nationwide right to abortion.

Embattled Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner will lose the state’s Democratic primary to Governor Janet Mills, a new poll found. EMILY’s List, which is supporting Mills in the primary, commissioned a poll from Impact Research that found Mills would lose to incumbent Senator Susan Collins (R) with just 42% of the vote. But that’s only when respondents were given “balanced information” about the candidates. When “additional information” was given about the Platner — such as quotes from deleted social media posts where he called himself a communist, and his Nazi symbol tattoo — Collins’ lead climbs to 57%. “The statements include quotes from Platner’s posts, including his history of stoking political violence, use of homophobic slurs, and offensive views towards law enforcement and sexual assault victims,” the memo stated. The poll was taken among 700 likely voters from October 22 to 27, with a 3.7% margin of error. The Cook Political Report currently ranks the race as a “toss-up.” The Republican won re-election in 2020 with 50.98%, compared to 42.39% for the Democrat, Sara Gideon. Platner has remained in the race despite the wave of negative headlines and most recently spoke out against the Democrats who backed the deal to reopen the federal government, even calling on Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to “step down.” “We get nothing. No healthcare. No subsidies,” Platner posted to X on Tuesday. “This is not a ‘deal.’ It’s a surrender.” The vote to reopen the government by Collins and other Senate Republicans, in addition to some Democrats, was the hot topic on the campaign trail in recent days. “This short-term continuing resolution would reopen government immediately, provide back pay to all federal workers, and fund important federal programs on which many Americans rely,” Collins, who is the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, wrote on X. Meanwhile, Mills said Collins “voted against extending ACA subsidies,” as an amendment to continue the Obamacare subsidies for another year was shot down by Senate Republicans. “This vote is a betrayal of Maine people, and it will send health care costs through the roof. While I have fought to expand health care and to make it more affordable, Senator Collins and Republicans in Washington are doing the opposite,” the governor posted. The Daily Wire reached out to the Platner, Collins, and Mills campaigns, which were not immediately available for comment. Democrat Jordan Wood dropped out of the Maine Democratic primary on Wednesday, instead opting to run for Maine’s Second Congressional District, which is now open due to Rep. Jared Golden’s (D-ME) retirement announcement. The seat is considered competitive, but is labeled by the Cook Political Report as “Likely Republican.”

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