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Hegseth fires Army’s top officer, Gen. Randy George
A Defense Department official confirmed a report that George has been asked to step down by Hegseth.
By Ashley Roque and Carley Welch on April 02, 2026 4:37 pmShare
WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has removed the US Army’s 41st Chief of Staff, Gen. Randy George.
The news was first reported by CBS News. A Defense Department official confirmed the report to Breaking Defense, but would not provide further information.
After publication, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said on X that “General Randy A. George will be retiring from his position as the 41st Chief of Staff of the Army effective immediately. The Department of War is grateful for General George’s decades of service to our nation. We wish him well in his retirement.”
It is not immediately clear who will replace George, but it is suspected that Lt. Gen. Christopher LaNeve, who was recently sworn in as the service’s new vice chief of staff, will replace him. LaNeve, a former 82nd Airborne Division commander, replaced Gen. James Mingus, who retired a full two years earlier than expected. (With George’s exit being “effective immediately,” LaNeve will likely slot in as the acting chief until a full confirmation process can be arranged.)
Notably, LaNeve served as a military aide to Hegseth. The secretary posted a congratulatory message after LaNeve was confirmed, calling him a “generational leader” who “will help ensure the Army revives the warrior ethos, rebuilds for the modern battlefield, and deters our enemies around the world.”
George is exiting the role nearly a year-and-a-half earlier than expected for the traditionally four-year role. He took office in fall of 2023.
Despite his abbreviated time at the helm, George had plenty on his plate: he helped the service navigate through a recruiting crisis, attempted to spiral new technology into the force at a quicker pace under the “Transformation in Contact” initiative, terminated a host of weapon development programs and oversaw a massive overhaul of the service’s acquisition workforce.
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And for the past year, George worked closely on the breadth of those changes with Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll, the service’s 26th civilian leader who has been reportedly at odds with Hegseth. As a result of the internal dynamics between Driscoll and Hegseth, there have been rumors that George could be fired for months.
After graduating from West Point, George commissioned as an infantry officer in 1988 before deploying to Desert Shield/Desert Storm with the 101st Airborne Division. Over the next three-and-a-half decades, he also served in Operation Iraqi Freedom, and deployed to Afghanistan as part of Operation Enduring Freedom. His firing comes as the US is once again embroiled in a conflict in the Middle East, this time with Iran.
Ahead of his ascent to the service’s top military officer post, he also served as the senior military assistant to then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin before eventually becoming Army’s vice-chief of staff.
Latest In A String Of Firings
While Hegseth did not detail why he was asking George to leave, he has promised to purge the Pentagon of “woke” generals supporting diversity and those who carried out orders related to the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. General officers with ties to Austin and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley have also been viewed as vulnerable targets, according to sources.
Over the course of the year, the ax fell first on Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Linda Fagan, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. CQ Brown, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti, Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. James Slife, Defense Intelligence Agency head Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse, National Security Agency and Cyber Command head Gen. Timothy Haugh and others.
The dismissal of top brass became a major political talking point in Washington last year with five former secretaries of defense — Lloyd Austin, William Perry, Chuck Hagel, Leon Panetta and Trump’s first defense secretary, Jim Mattis — issuing an open letter to lawmakers, saying they are “alarmed” by the dismissals.
“We write to urge the US Congress to hold Mr. Trump to account for these reckless actions and to exercise fully its Constitutional oversight responsibilities,” they wrote, noting that the president has not provided a justification for the firings.
“Mr. Trump’s dismissals raise troubling questions about the administration’s desire to politicize the military and to remove legal constraints on the President’s power,” the former defense secretaries later added. “We, like many Americans — including many troops — are therefore left to conclude that these leaders are being fired for purely partisan reasons.”
Left unchecked, they warned that potential recruits may shy away from serving in the military and those already in uniform may shy away from “speaking truth to power” for fear of retribution.
UPDATED 4/2/2026 AT 5:10 ET to include information regarding Gen. George’s background and context related to recent firings within the Defense Department.
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