President Donald Trump will sign an executive order on Sept. 5 renaming the Department of Defense to its previous title, the Department of War, senior administration officials confirmed on Thursday.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt also confirmed the announcement on X.
“Pete, you started off by saying ’the Department of Defense.’ And somehow it didn’t sound good to me,” Trump said, speaking to Hegseth.
“Defense. What are we, defense? Why are we defense? It used to be called the Department of War, and it had a stronger sound. And, as you know, we won World War I, we won World War II, we won everything. Now we have a Department of Defense. We’re defenders. I don’t know.”
Jackson Richman contributed to this report.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
