Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth provided a key update on Friday morning following the deadly air crash in Washington, DC, on Wednesday evening.

During an interview on Fox & Friends, Hegseth defended President Donald Trump partially blaming DEI for the disaster.

Co-host Ainsley Earhardt kicked off the segment by saying: “Let’s talk about DEI. What was happening in the control tower? We talked to Congressman Troy Nehls, and he said that at this airport, which is the busiest runway in our country, they needed 30 personnel inside the control tower. There were currently 19 when this crashed. And then there’s a lawsuit that alleged that the FAA turned away nearly a thousand air traffic controller applicants solely based on race last year. And then there is a report that the FAA launched a national outreach program for DTI, which included a push to hire workers with severe intellectual disabilities and psychiatric problems.”

“When you’re a mom and you’re a dad and you’re putting your kids on the plane or you’re flying as a family, that’s unacceptable. We don’t care your race. We want to make sure whoever’s in there that it’s fully manned. And we want to make sure they’re qualified,” Earhardt added.

“Completely unacceptable, Ainsley. You’re exactly right. So I don’t know exactly how the staffing occurred in that particular air traffic control tower. And it sounds like there was a shortage and the investigation will tell us more about that. But the environment around which we choose, pilots or air traffic controllers, as the president pointed out correctly yesterday, better be the highest possible standard, the best of the best who are managing, you know, multiple flights. I mean, a flight a minute and managing radio traffic,” Hegseth replied.

“I think the closest analogy to military service guys is it pilots or air traffic controllers. I don’t care what background they come from, what their race is, what their gender is, if they’re rich or they’re poor, I just need them to be good at their job because I need my flight to land safely. The same thing applies to the Defense Department, to our military. I don’t care about your background, your gender or your skin color. I want the best,” Hegseth added.

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“And that’s why when the president says merit-based and colorblind, he’s exactly right across government. So he’s correct to point out at the FAA or in our flights, it should not be about anything other than excellence. That’s it. Excellence. I don’t care. The color of the skin of the pilot of my plane or the air traffic controller,” Hegseth said.

“But we’ve for too long under Biden cared about those things, emphasized those things, pushed real or perceived quotas at the Defense Department were ending all of that,” he added.

“It’s been made very clear across all of our services and commands. It is merit only. And that means we’ll get the best of the best. And that’s what our taxpayers and the American people expect and deserve. And in the business of warfighting, which the Defense Department is in. If you don’t have the best of the best, you lose people. And that’s why this is so important,” Hegseth added.

While speaking in the White House briefing room, the president began things by holding a moment of silence for all of the victims, calling it a moment of “anguish.”

“Sadly, there are no survivors,” Trump said.

“Together we take solace in the knowledge that their journey ended not in the cold waters of the Potomac, but in the warm embrace of a loving God,” Trump said.

Trump added: “They are working tirelessly to figure out exactly what happened. We will state certain opinions, however. I’m also immediately appointing an acting commissioner to the FAA, Christopher Rocheleau, a 22-year veteran of the agency, highly respected. Christopher, thank you very much. Appreciate it.”

Trump also tore into DEI and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, calling him a “disaster” who just had a “good line of bullsh*t.”

“The FAA website shows that the agency’s guidance on diversity hiring were last updated on March 23rd of ‘22. They wanted to make it even more so. And then I came in, and I assume maybe this is the reason. The FAA, which is overseen by Secretary Pete Buttigieg, a real winner, that guy’s a real winner. Do you know how badly everything’s run since he’s run this Department of Transportation? He’s a disaster. He was a disaster as a mayor. He ran his city into the ground, and he’s a disaster now. He’s just got a good line of bullshit. The Department of Transportation, his government agency charged with regulating civil aviation. Well, he runs it, 45,000 people, and he’s run it right into the ground with his diversity,” Trump said.