Officials originally scheduled to attend included the head of the U.S. Space Force, the admiral in charge of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, and the general in charge of U.S. Special Operations Command. (Scripps News)

Aspen

The U.S. Department of Defense has pulled senior officials, including the heads of the Space Force, Indo-Pacific Command, and Special Operations Command, from attending the Aspen Security Forum. The Pentagon stated that the decision was due to the forum's values not aligning with those of the department. 

The Aspen Security Forum, which has hosted bipartisan and international leaders for over a decade, will continue with its scheduled events. Notable attendees still include former national security officials and international ministers, although some, such as Senator John Cornyn, have also withdrawn without providing a reason.

Pentagon removes senior officials from Aspen Security Forum

Aspen Security Forum. The Pentagon pulled senior officials from attending the important event, which kicks off today. That's where we find Scripps News National Security Correspondent Liz Lander. She is live in Aspen. And Liz, looking at that backdrop, it's hard to imagine anyone giving up the opportunity to be out there right now. But did the Defense Department give a reason for why they pulled their participants? Yeah, Andrew, this was a late-breaking development right before this conference is slated to start today. Yesterday, the Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, tweeted out a news article that was saying that all of the Defense Department officials had been withdrawn and pulled out of participating in this event today, which begins today, I should say. Now, the chief Pentagon spokesperson, Sean Parnell, sent over Scripps News a statement earlier today. And it said, in part, that the Defense Department is not sending officials because the Aspen Security Forum, quote, their values do not align with the values of the Department of Defense. Now, the people who were supposed to be here on behalf of the Defense Department included some top officials, including the head of Space Force, the admiral who's in charge of the Indo-Pacific Command, and the general who's in charge of the Special Ops Command. All of those people now have withdrawn. I confirmed with two of those offices that those generals, those admirals will not be in attendance here in Aspen. Now, the Aspen Security Forum put a statement out, and they sent this over to Scripps News yesterday. It said, in part, quote, this year, we extended invitations to senior Trump administration officials, including several cabinet-level leaders. Today, the Department of Defense gave their speakers guidance that they will no longer be participating. We will miss the participation of the Pentagon, but our invitations remain open. So Aspen has been putting on the Security Forum here for more than a decade. There are leaders from both sides of the aisle who typically come to this. And also, I would add as well, Andrew, that international leaders will be at this summit this week, too. One other point, though, that I would make to sort of just give a sense of the political environment that we're in right now, Senator John Cornyn, who is a Republican from Texas, he is in a very tough primary election right now out of Texas. He was also slated to speak here on a panel with two other senators on Friday. His office confirmed to me yesterday that he is no longer planning to attend this forum. They did not give a reason why he canceled, Andrew. And Liz, as you pointed out, tons of influential officials. What is it that you'll be following this week? Yeah, Andrew, national security really hits on almost all sectors of American politics and American government these days. And the agenda for the next few days really reflects that. We're going to see forums on, we will see discussions on a range of topics from obviously defense, but also technology, artificial intelligence, deepfake technology. That's something you and I have talked about a lot that has become an issue with Secretary of State Marco Rubio having his voice deepfaked recently. I'm sure that will come up in these talks in the next few days. There are also defense contractors here, space contractors as well, and energy policy and cyber security policy, Andrew. And some of the notable names that we'll be seeing here as well, former President Biden's national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, will be here. The former Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, will also be in attendance, Condoleezza Rice. And then in terms of current officials, people like the Ukrainian defense minister, which I think will be a very timely discussion considering what we're hearing from President Trump right now about his talks with Putin and sending more weapons to Ukraine at the moment. We're also expecting to hear from foreign affairs ministers like the Singaporean foreign affairs minister, the current hostage affairs envoy for the Trump administration. So there are a few Trump administration officials that we are expecting to see here like that official and also the U.S. ambassador to Turkey, Tom Barak, who is a close friend of President Trump's. They will both be here as well. So this is really a range of elected officials, policy leaders, tech titans, and also some of these folks in the private sector as well, Andrew. So we'll have reports throughout the week and hopefully some newsmaker interviews as well. All right. We are looking forward to your dispatches over the next few days. National security correspondent Liz Landers for us in Aspen. Liz, thank you.

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Breakdown