The U.S. House of Representatives voted 211-204 on Tuesday evening, 10 November 2026, to block an effort to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, choosing instead to refer the eight articles of impeachment to committee.
The move effectively ends the impeachment attempt for now. A majority of House members backed sending the articles to the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee, the BBC reported. Republican Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky, who introduced the articles, was the only Republican to vote against referring the resolution, according to the BBC.
Massie introduced the eight articles on Monday, 9 November, accusing Hegseth of violating federal war powers laws over the war in Iran and of other alleged high crimes and misdemeanors. Scripps News reported that the House vote was a procedural vote to refer the articles to committee, rather than a vote on the impeachment charges themselves.
Earlier on Tuesday, Hegseth dismissed the impeachment effort at his first Pentagon news conference since May, calling it a “farce.” He argued that a policy disagreement was not a high crime or misdemeanor, and said he stood by the Iran operations.
President Donald Trump welcomed the result later on Tuesday on social media. In a post reported by the BBC, Trump described the outcome as an exoneration of Hegseth and called Massie “a major LOSER.”
If Hegseth were ultimately impeached, he would be only the third Cabinet member in U.S. history to be impeached by the House. Removing him from office would then require a two-thirds vote in the Senate, or 67 of 100 senators.
Sources: BBC News and Scripps News (TMJ4).
