Overview
- Hegseth, visiting Fort Campbell on Monday during the 101st’s Week of the Eagles, presented nine Purple Hearts to veterans whose wounds date to a 2003 insider attack and 2006 combat in Iraq.
- In the 2003 case, Army Sgt. Hasan Akbar threw grenades into tents at Camp Pennsylvania in Kuwait and opened fire, killing Capt. Christopher Seifert and Maj. Gregory Stone and wounding others; he was convicted and is held at Fort Leavenworth.
- Victims of the 2003 attack had long been denied the medal because rules require wounds from enemy action, and Army officials did not say Monday whether new evidence now links the attacker to an enemy group.
- Several other eligible soldiers from the 2003 incident are set to receive their medals at a later Pentagon ceremony, extending the effort to publicly honor those previously overlooked.
- After the ceremony Monday, Hegseth endorsed a congressional candidate in Hebron, Kentucky, which drew a Democracy Forward request for an inspector general review as the Pentagon said the appearance complied with the law.