Former Republican strategist Sarah Longwell believes President Donald Trump may be preparing to sacrifice Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth as criticism intensifies over his war with Iran.

In an interview with Ezra Klein of the New York Times, Longwell said Trump may eventually need a member of his administration to serve as a "sacrificial lamb" amid public anger over a conflict she described as the most unpopular war in US history — one that has sent prices skyrocketing.

"I do think that Donald Trump needs somebody to take the fall for the war," Longwell said. "My guess is that Pete Hegseth goes, but nobody buys that."

Klein observed that Hegseth has enthusiastically taken ownership of the war, though he questioned whether the public would accept the defense secretary as the official ultimately responsible. As defense secretary, Hegseth heads the Pentagon, the department responsible for the US armed forces and the conduct of American military operations. Longwell suggested Trump has continued backing Hegseth because he values him as a cheerleader.

"I have no idea why he's still there. He shouldn't be," she said. Longwell also called Hegseth's leadership style "preposterous," citing his plans for the live execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan (the Army major who killed 13 people in the 2009 mass shooting at the Texas base), his transphobic language, and his focus on "fatties, beardos and weirdos."

The interview drew on Longwell's extensive focus group research with Americans who voted for Trump in 2024. Focus groups bring small groups of voters together for moderated discussions, a method intended to surface the reasoning behind their political attitudes. According to Longwell, the president's tariffs and the Iran war have become the central points of friction with MAGA voters, because both stem directly from the president's own decisions and cannot be blamed on the previous administration in a way that would convince voters.

She explained that these voters supported Trump believing he would lower prices and keep the United States out of foreign wars. Instead, she said, they are confronting high gas prices, more expensive household bills, and a war that has no end date.

Some supporters, Longwell said, initially expected the Iran operation to follow the pattern of the administration's intervention in Venezuela, where US forces quickly captured Nicolás Maduro without casualties. "I thought it was going to be like Venezuela," she said voters have told her. As the fighting continued, Trump repeatedly claimed it would be over quickly — a pattern, she argued, that has made it harder for his voters to separate the president from the consequences of his policies.

Longwell also described a widening split between Trump loyalists and the "America First" faction, which includes figures such as former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who have broken with the president over the Iran war among other White House decisions. For those voters, she said, opposition to the war centers on American military personnel dying in a foreign conflict, alongside a rising cost of living that recalls his failed promises.

Whether Hegseth ultimately becomes the sacrificial lamb remains to be seen, but Longwell believes the political responsibility is unlikely to disappear with him.