The father of one of the soldiers who died in the Iran campaign is pushing back on claims made by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Per NBC News, Hegseth met with the families of the fallen soldiers this week and made some claims about what he was told.
“What I heard through tears, through hugs, through strength, and through unbreakable resolve was the same from family after family. They said, ‘Finish this. Honor their sacrifice. Do not waver. Do not stop until the job is done,” Hegseth said, per NBC News.
But one father, Charles Simmons, whose son Tech. Sgt. Tyler H. Simmons was among the six who were killed in the refueling plane crash in Iraq, said something different.
BREAKING NBC:
Pete Hegseth says ‘family after family’ of service members killed urged the admin to “not stop until the job is done.”
But the father of one of those service members says he never said that.
“I can’t speak for the other families. When he spoke to me, that was not…
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) March 20, 2026
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“I can’t speak for the other families. When he spoke to me, that was not something we talked about,” Simmons said, per NBC.
Simmons did say that he spoke to both Hegseth and the president, and that he was “grateful for the warmth that both men showed him.”
“I understand there’s a lot of peril that goes into making decisions like this, and I just certainly hope the decisions being made are necessary,” the elder Simmons said. He also said he had “questions” about the war, and he couldn’t draw “definitive conclusions when I don’t have all the data.”
“Who wants war?” Simmons said. “Sometimes it’s a necessity, and I just don’t know what’s going on.”
“Secretary Hegseth has the utmost respect for our Gold Star families and has pledged to honor the sacrifice of their loved ones,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement. “While at Dover, the Secretary spoke with each family of our fallen heroes and the details of each individual conversation remain private.”
“Tyler had a magnetic personality,” Simmons said of his son. “Never met any strangers. He’d walk into the room, and it would be immediately illuminated.”
Photo courtesy of the Political Tribune media library.
