Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III is not planning to resign over the failure to disclose his hospitalization to President Joe Biden and senior members of the administration for days, officials said Jan. 8.
“The Secretary has no plans to resign,” Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Maj. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder told reporters. “He continues to stay focused on conducting his duties as the Secretary and executing our mission.”
President Biden continues to have confidence in the Austin, White House officials added.
Biden “respects the fact that Secretary Austin took ownership for the lack of transparency,” adding that the president has no plans to ask for Austin’s resignation, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.
But Austin’s aides are struggling to explain why no one at the Pentagon informed the White House or U.S. military leaders that Austin, the president’s top civilian military advisor and a top Cabinet official in the presidential line of succession, went to the hospital, where he remains, on Jan. 1.
“A very small number of folks knew about it,” Ryder said.
At least four top aides knew about Austin’s status soon after the hospitalization. But the White House was not informed until Jan. 4—the day the U.S. conducted a rare targeted killing of a militia leader in an airstrike in Baghdad.
“The Secretary of Defense’s chief of staff had been out sick with the flu, which caused a delay in these notifications,” Ryder said. “We can all agree, in terms of the notification processes here, we need a new normal.”
Top Pentagon officials, such as service secretaries and chiefs, including Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall, Air Force Chief of Staff David W. Allvin, and Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Saltzman, were not officially notified until Jan. 5, only hours before a public statement was released, according to the Pentagon. Congress was notified shortly before that statement.
“I remain concerned that vital chain of command and notification procedures were not followed while the Secretary was under medical care,” Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a Jan. 8 statement. “This lack of disclosure must never happen again.”
Austin has taken ultimate responsibility for the failure to notify the administration, Congress, and the public in a timely way. But how that failure occurred is still murky.
Austin’s top civilian aides, including Kelly Magsamen, his chief of staff, and Chris Meagher, the assistant to the secretary of defense for public affairs, knew of Austin’s hospitalization on Jan. 2, as did Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Air Force Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. and some of Austin’s top uniformed aides, including his senior military assistant Army Lt. Gen. Ronald P. Clark and Ryder.
“We’ll do what’s akin to a hot wash and try to see if processes and procedures need to be changed at all or modified so that we can learn from this,” added Kirby, the former Pentagon spokesman.
Austin was in severe pain on Jan. 1 and had to be transported by ambulance to the intensive care unit at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center—meaning he was unlikely in any condition to draft a public statement or make phone calls. On Jan. 2, some of Austin’s duties were transferred to Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks due to Austin’s medical condition, though Hicks did not know Austin was hospitalized for another two days. Austin originally had an “elective” medical procedure on Dec. 22, during which he temporarily transferred responsibility to Hicks, Ryder said.
Austin resumed his duties Jan. 5, and on Jan. 8, he spoke to Hicks and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, and received an “operational update” from U.S. Central Command boss Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurrila, the Pentagon said.
“While we wish Sec. Austin a speedy recovery, we are concerned with how the disclosure of the Secretary’s condition was handled,” Reps. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) and Adam Smith (D-Wash.), chairman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said in a joint statement issued Jan. 7. “Transparency is vitally important.”
Austin’s office is conducting a review of the incident. On Jan. 8, Magsamen ordered an inquiry to account for what happened and improve the process in the future.
Within 30 days, the review will establish the timeline of events concerning Austin’s hospitalization and evaluate the process for determining whether the secretary of defense is unable to perform their duties. The review will also include recommendations on how to improve the procedures to notify the president and senior defense officials.
Effectively immediately, the DOD is changing procedures for transferring authority from the secretary of defense to include the reason for the transfer in internal government communications. Notifications of the transfer will be distributed to top Pentagon officials, U.S. military commanders across the world, and the White House Situation Room.
“We absolutely want the trust of the American public,” Ryder concluded. “We want the trust of the media. We want the trust of Congress. We will continue to learn from this experience. We’ll continue to work hard to do better next time.“