Hegseth touts ‘standards’ after Texas removes troops who did not meet physical requirements following viral photo

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has celebrated the apparent reassignment of overweight Texas National Guard troopers in Chicago whose photo went viral last week.

"Standards are back at the Department of War," crowed the former Fox News host on his personal X account on Monday, linking to a news story about the soldiers.

Hegseth has repeatedly grouched about fitness standards in the Armed Forces, saying in April that troops "need to be fit, not fat" and telling hundreds of top military leaders summoned to Virginia last month that he found it "tiring" to see "fat troops".

But when the Texas National Guard arrived outside Chicago last week as part of President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown, Associated Press photographer Erin Hooley snapped a picture of several troopers who were visibly carrying extra weight.

On Sunday the Texas Military Department confirmed that it had replaced "a small group" of the 200 National Guard members serving in Illinois, though it refused to specify which troops, how many, or why they were removed.

"In less than 24 hours, Texas National Guardsmen mobilized for the Federal Protection Mission," a spokesperson told the military news website Task & Purpose, which first reported on the troops' reassignment.

"The speed of the response necessitated a concurrent validation process, during which we identified a small group of service members who were not in compliance and have been replaced."

The federal National Guard Bureau said Thursday that all soldiers must meet "service-specific height, weight, and physical fitness standards at all times", and that non-compliant members would be pulled from missions and returned to their home stations.

The Trump administration has launched a massive deportation campaign in the sanctuary city of Chicago, with armed and masked agents stopping cars, grabbing people off the street, and even raiding an apartment building with flashbangs and helicopters in a military-style raid.

The resulting protests have often met with violence from federal agents, who have repeatedly been caught on video throwing or tackling demonstrators to the ground and bombarding them with less-lethal munitions despite being in no visible danger.

Last week the administration federalized 200 National Guard members from Texas and 500 from Illinois in order to guard federal buildings in and around Chicago, although for now they are blocked from doing so by a court order.

That is against the wishes of of Illinois's Democratic Governor J.B. Pritzker, who has accused the president of deliberately trying to "cause chaos" as a "pretext" for invoking the Insurrection Act.

A lawsuit filed by Chicago and Illinois officials insisted that protesters have "never come close to stopping federal immigration enforcement" — one possible condition for invoking the Act.

The Department of Homeland Security accused Pritzker of spouting "lies", saying its actions were "neither unconstitutional nor an invasion" and that claims of racial profiling were "disgusting, reckless, and categorically FALSE".

Addressing claims of brutality against protesters, the Department said: "Rioters against DHS and other law enforcement in Illinois have been anything but peaceful... DHS is taking reasonable and constitutional measures to uphold the rule of law and protect our officers."

The Texas Military Department did not respond to a request for comment.