Fascinating -- June 18, 2019

June 18, 2019, T+18 (link here): Acting Defense Secretary Shanahan won't go forward with confirmation, Trump says. Shanahan wants to spend more time with his family. March 28, 2019, article: When will Trump nominate a permanent defense secretary?

In the 70 years before 2019, the Department of Defense had never gone more than two months without a permanent leader. Now, President Donald Trump’s administration is poised to double that wait.

The post formerly filled by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has been open since January 1, 2019, a leadership void that has drawn increasing concern among lawmakers.

From Talking Points Memo:

President Trump on Tuesday announced that Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan has declined to move forward with the confirmation process to formally assume the role. At the same time, a new report was published outlining shocking details from episodes of domestic violence within Shanahan’s family.

Trump said he would name Army Secretary Mark Esper as the acting secretary. Shanahan’s withdrawal is not completely unexpected, as Yahoo News reported Monday that his confirmation process was being hampered by a longer-than-usual FBI background check, which included a domestic violence episode that resulted in his ex-wife’s arrest.

He addressed that and some other grisly familial incidents with the Washington Post in a story published nearly simultaneously with Trump’s tweets.

In November 2011, Shanahan’s then-17-year-old son William beat his mother with a baseball bat, rendering her unconscious in a pool of her own blood. She sustained skull fractures and internal injuries so severe that they required surgery.

And much more at the link.

Sounds like someone needs to spend more time with his family. Although I assume his "original" family is now quite dispersed. He is divorced, father of three. This all happened almost ten years ago. This article, May 14, 2019, completely missed the history of family violence. This article has more but is also lacking.

From wiki:

Shanahan served as Deputy Secretary of Defense from 2017 to 2019. He previously spent 30 years at Boeing in a variety of roles.

On May 9, 2019, President Trump announced his intention to nominate Shanahan as the Secretary of Defense, a decision that was reversed on June 18, 2019.

Again, it seems Trump was given really, really bad advice when Shanahan was brought on as Deputy SecDef.