Army Secretary Dan Driscoll Resigns Amid Hegseth Tension

Army Secretary Dan Driscoll resigned after speaking with President Trump, ending months of friction with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Officials said he spoke with President Donald Trump about "the current state of the Army" before submitting the letter, and the White House confirmed the departure while praising Driscoll as "highly effective" in advancing the president's agenda. The White House has not yet accepted the resignation, according to one U.S. official, and no official reason was given for the exit.

Driscoll is a close ally of Vice President JD Vance, an Iraq war veteran, and was widely known as Trump's "drone guy" for embracing emerging battlefield technology. He had also taken on roles far beyond a typical Army secretary, helping negotiate an end to the Russia-Ukraine war and even serving as acting ATF director. A resignation from such a well-connected figure, rather than a quiet end-of-tenure transition, signals deep dysfunction at the Pentagon's top ranks. Aides had earlier signaled he planned only an average tenure of roughly 23 months, but the timing — during an active war — makes the break jarring.

The resignation caps months of reported tension with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Hegseth ousted Gen. Randy George — Driscoll's close friend and ally — as Army chief of staff in April, and in August Gen. Christopher LaNeve closed the specialized drone unit Driscoll had championed, forcing it back into a traditional infantry battalion. Sources said Driscoll raised concerns with the administration about Army transformation and readiness and about Hegseth blocking those efforts by firing the responsible generals, including efforts to learn from Ukrainian drone warfare.

Multiple outlets reported the same core account on Monday. A U.S. official said Driscoll spoke to the president about the Army's condition and then submitted his resignation, while another source said the White House had not yet accepted it. The White House statement, given to reporters, praised his leadership during "historic military operations" and his work on Russia-Ukraine negotiations. CBS News also reported that Deputy Army Undersecretary Dave Fitzgerald is expected to step down this week, and that Driscoll had considered leaving by year's end.

The departure lands as the U.S. war with Iran reaches its sixth month, a conflict military leaders have reportedly cautioned is unsustainable. Driscoll is the latest in a string of high-level exits — Navy Secretary John Phelan and Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George were both pushed out earlier this year, and Hegseth has fired more than a dozen senior officers.

With the resignation not yet accepted, the White House faces a decision on whether to let Driscoll go now or hold him through a period of active conflict and ahead of the midterm elections, historically a time of administration turnover. A successor will inherit an Army mid-transformation, with the Army Transformation Initiative's push toward unmanned systems now colliding with leadership decisions to phase out its drone battalion. One source noted Driscoll had always planned roughly 23 months in the role and sought "built-in, lasting change" — whether that change survives him remains the open question.