Senator Cotton is calling for an immediate investigation to be launched into the U.S. Military Academy at West Point after a spokesman for the school mistakenly told a left-wing press outlet, ProPublica, that the nominee for secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, had never applied or been accepted to the school when he was a teenager. 

Wednesday morning, Mr. Hegseth posted a copy of his 1999 acceptance letter from West Point, stating that ProPublica was “planning to publish a knowingly false report that I was not accepted to West Point in 1999.”

The editor of ProPublica says the outlet investigated the story after hearing rumors about Mr. Hegseth having never applied to the school. Officials at West Point later erroneously stated on two separate occasions to the outlet that the rumors were true. When ProPublica reached out to Mr. Hegseth’s lawyer for a copy of his admission letter and was provided a copy of it, they did not run the story and West Point later apologized. 

“No, we are not publishing a story. This is how journalism is supposed to work. Hear something. Check something. Repeat steps 1 and 2 as many times as needed. The end,” ProPublica’s editor, Jesse Eisinger, wrote on X. In a statement, a spokesman for the academy said an employee in its public relations office made a mistake. 

“A review of our records indicates Mr. Peter Hegseth was offered admission to West Point in 1999 but did not attend West Point,” the school said of the nominee, who later attended Princeton University. 

“An incorrect statement involving Mr. Hegseth’s admission to the United States Military Academy was released by an employee on December 10, 2024. Upon further review of an achieved database, employees realized this statement was in error,” the school said. “USMA takes this situation very seriously, and we apologize for this administrative error.”

Senator Cotton, who like Mr. Hegseth is an Army combat veteran, said the academy must launch an investigation into the error for potential violations of federal law. 

“I’m concerned about reports that a U.S. Military Academy official has provided false information to a left-wing reporter writing a derogatory hit piece about Pete Hegseth,” Mr. Cotton wrote to West Point’s superintendent, Lieutenant General Steven Gilland. “I understand that a civilian public-affairs officer, Theresa Brinkerhoff, informed a reporter that Mr. Hegseth didn’t apply to West Point, as he has said publicly in the past. This statement is incorrect.”

“The statement may violate Mr. Hegseth’s rights under the Privacy Act of 1974 by revealing protected personal information. If true, it also demonstrates egregiously bad judgment to share such information about the nominee to be Secretary of Defense with a known liberal outlet like ProPublica,” he added.

“Could you please promptly look into this matter?” Mr. Cotton asked. “Perhaps there’s an honest mistake here, though I can’t imagine what it might be. But I also can’t imagine this action was authorized or known to the West Point leadership.”

Vice President-elect Vance weighed in on behalf of Mr. Hegseth Wednesday, saying that ProPublica was duped by a low-level bureaucrat when the outlet went searching for dirt on Mr. Hegseth. 

“You were misled by a bureaucrat. That’s actually a story, just not the one you wanted to print,” Mr. Vance wrote in response to Mr. Eisinger. “The effort to tank Hegseth’s nomination is one of the most coordinated smear campaigns I’ve ever seen in DC.”

Others came to ProPublica’s defense, however. A reporter at the conservative Washington Free Beacon, Andrew Kerr, said on X that all the blame for the story lies with West Point for giving ProPublica inaccurate information. 

“West Point public affairs lied to ProPublica, wrongly said Pete Hegseth never even applied to the academy. Hegseth responded with a copy of his 1999 West Point acceptance letter, killing ProPublica’s story. Big error from West Point,” Mr. Kerr said.