Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reveals why military recruitment has soared under Trump

Joining "Fox & Friends" unrecorded from Normandy, France, wherever Allied forces erstwhile stormed the beaches to crook the tide of World War II, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth honored the 81st day of D-Day with a connection that looked not lone to the past but to the future.

As the federation honors the bravery and sacrifices of World War II veterans, Hegseth emphasized a caller question of patriotism among today's young Americans – 1 helium says is driving an uptick successful military recruitment.

"It's historic. Of people it's a morale shift. It shifts backmost to the time President Trump was elected and past inaugurated," helium said Friday.

WORLD WAR II VETERANS TRAVEL TO NORMANDY FOR EMOTIONAL D-DAY COMMEMORATION

US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth attends the gathering of North Atlantic Council defence ministers during the NATO defence ministers' gathering astatine the NATO office connected June 05, 2025 successful Brussels, Belgium. (Omar Havana)

The Army unsocial has posted the champion recruiting numbers successful years, reaching 61,000 for fiscal twelvemonth 2025, with 4 months remaining. That's an summation of much than 6,000 from 55,150 successful fiscal twelvemonth 2024.

Hegseth told co-hosts Ainsley Earhardt, Lawrence Jones and Brian Kilmeade that the tone wrong the U.S. equipped forces is "incredible" close now, and the morale displacement isn't isolated to the Army.

"It's besides the Air Force, it's besides the Navy, it is besides the Marine Corps, Coast Guard and, arsenic the president says, instrumentality enforcement," helium continued. 

"Across the board, the tone of our country, [there's a] willingness and tendency to serve, due to the fact that they spot enactment that believes successful the state that's going to person their back, that says, 'We privation you to beryllium warriors. We're not doing this politically close garbage anymore. We're doing warfare fighting. We're training, we're preparing, we're focused connected [getting] backmost to basics, and… the young radical of America person responded, and they'll proceed to respond."

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Army recruiting numbers  (Fox & Friends/Screengrab)

Hegseth attended this year's ceremonial wherever subject officials and veterans commemorated the 81st day of D-Day.

He started his greeting with a carnal grooming league with rangers from the 75th Ranger Regiment connected Omaha Beach astatine astir the aforesaid clip arsenic the archetypal landing trade would person deed successful 1944.

"These men [World War II soldiers] were consenting to complaint toward the guns with astir nary accidental of success, particularly successful those archetypal waves, and they did it for us," helium said.

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Days ago, the defence caput honored the sacrifices of U.S. equipped forces astatine Arlington National Cemetery successful Washington, D.C., wherever helium greeted a fig of World War II veterans whose resoluteness remains precocious much than fractional a period later.

"The opposition of those 100-year-old World War II vets and past those 25-year aged Army Rangers that I did a workout with this greeting – the humor of warring for state inactive pumps successful the veins of Americans, and we inactive rise those types, and that's what was truly chill to see."