As U.S. secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth is trying to overhaul how legal advice is provided in the Pentagon and how the broader military justice system operates. Although he’s referred to the Judge Advocate General Corps as “vital,” he has also called military lawyers “JAGoffs.” That contempt appears to be shaping many of his decisions. Soon after taking office, he fired the top lawyers for the Army and Air Force.
In March, he directed the military departments’ general counsels and the Judge Advocates General to “review the current allocation of legal resources and functions to identify and reduce duplicity [sic], to provide clarity to roles and reporting relationships, and to ensure our legal practice areas are aligned with the Department’s core functions and priorities.” That broad review, conducted not only internally, but on an extremely abbreviated 45-day schedule, will inevitably affect the administration of military justice. The deadline has expired, but no results have been made public. Nor is there any indication that the public will have an opportunity even to comment on the findings.
Then, on May 11, Hegseth announced in a video that he was creating an internal “special” panel led by Earl Matthews, general counsel at the Department of Defense, to review “all aspects of the military legal system as it affects our warriors.” The announcement was ridiculous because such a panel already exists or did until Hegseth effectively shut it down last year. Now, he is trying to resurrect it, but this time under his control rather than allow it to be independent as Congress envisioned. The official document setting up his new process has not been made public, but Thomas Novelly of Defense One has seen a copy and reports:
“The [panel] will operate on a sustained basis rather than producing a single end-of-review report,” Hegseth wrote in the memo. “It will deliver interim reports and recommendations on specific issues as they are completed, with periodic updates to me. These reports will drive immediate reforms to cut unnecessary bureaucracy, strengthen training and organization, refine culture, and professionalize military justice implementation and command advice.”
This is highly concerning. Rather than some new handcrafted DoD entity, it is crucial that the Military Justice Review Panel (MJRP) be restored as required under statute. Any further erosion of confidence in the country’s military justice system–for that will be the outcome of Hegseth’s internal effort–will have a profound negative impact on the U.S. military’s good order and discipline, and morale, and detract from the country’s national security.
An Independent Panel Is Shut Down
Congress created the Military Justice Review Panel (MJRP) as part of the Military Justice Act of 2016. It replaced the largely moribund Code Committee on Military Justice that Congress created when it first passed the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) in 1950. The Panel’s statutory purpose is to “conduct independent periodic reviews and assessments of the operation” of the UCMJ and to report its findings and recommendations to Congress, specifically to the Committees on Armed Services of the Senate and House of Representatives. It was envisioned as an “independent blue ribbon panel of experts,” that reports to Congress and not the secretary of defense. Its 13 members are selected by the attorney general, the secretary of defense (in consultation with the secretary of homeland security), the JAGs, the chairs and ranking members of the armed services committees of the House and Senate, the Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, and the Chief Justice of the United States. This is as blue as blue ribbon can be. The Panel was chartered to enhance the “efficiency and effectiveness of the UCMJ and the Code’s implementing regulations.” The UCMJ is, of course, the military’s code of criminal procedure; it’s an Act of Congress. The primary implementing regulation is the Manual for Courts-Martial, which fills in the details and is promulgated personally by the president as an executive order. Both the Code and the Manual have the force of law.
In April 2022, after some delay, the Office of the Secretary of Defense finalized and formally announced the composition of the new panel. Its members, who serve without pay for statutorily prescribed eight-year terms, were selected based on their expertise in criminal law and experience in investigation, prosecution, defense, victim representation, or adjudication with respect to courts-martial, federal civilian courts, or state courts. Each was a veteran. All told, they brought more than 250 years of military experience to the task.
The Panel submitted its first review and assessment in December 2024 after conducting numerous public meetings and closed executive sessions. On March 7, 2025, however, the Department of Defense directed the MJRP to cease operations. Although DoD is required by law to “provide staffing and resources to support the Panel,” it reassigned most of the MJRP staff. By the end of April 2025, MJRP members were notified, without explanation, that their service had “concluded.” On May 8, 2025, despite having effectively been shut down, the MJRP submitted its final report. The report notified Congress of the sequence of events that led to its demise and recommended that Congress act essentially to protect its own authority under Article I, section 8, of the Constitution to “make rules” for the regulation of the armed forces and to provide for the organizing and disciplining of the militia.
A year later, the MJRP lives on, at best, in limbo. It remains to be seen whether the members whose service was unceremoniously “concluded” less than halfway through their statutory terms will be reinstated. Although there have been reports that DoD has solicited nominations for new members, its failure to reinstate or reconstitute the panel is concerning.
Now, Hegseth wants us to believe that a panel to review military justice is his brand-new idea. He’d like us to believe that no one has ever heard of the Military Justice Review Panel. Although it is possible that Hegseth is so busy he has forgotten about the existence of the MJRP, it is more likely that the documents appointing new members for the MJRP have reached his desk and he wants greater control than what Congress allows him. In either case, his latest announcement that he’s creating a new panel renders the MJRP obsolete. If a panel controlled by the secretary of defense moves forward, it also dooms any chance for a measured, objective, transparent, and, ultimately, credible review of military justice.
The MJRP was created by Congress to help foster public confidence in the military justice system, and military justice is not a partisan issue. By requiring the MJRP’s members to have practiced before courts-martial, federal courts, and state courts, Congress intended for the body to reflect a variety of perspectives, including criminal investigation, prosecution, defense, and crime victims. An internal board of the kind Hegseth has in mind would simply not meet the requirements of objectivity, perspective, and transparency necessary to enhance the trust of the American public and of U.S. servicemembers.
The administration should revive the MJRP without further delay and see that it is fully staffed and supported to continue its nonpartisan, transparent assessment of military justice. It is also essential that the panel’s members are not replaced. If they are, it is certain to adversely affect the panel’s credibility. If a new panel is created, no matter who is named to it, it will inevitably function under a shadow. It will have to work overtime to demonstrate that its findings and recommendations are free from external pressures or undue influence.
If the Trump administration does not reinstate the MJRP, Congress should vigorously object to the creation of Hegseth’s “special review panel” and demand that the MJRP, created by a still-in-force federal statute with a mandate to report to Congress, be revived immediately. Confidence in the country’s adherence to the rule of law and in the U.S. military justice system has never been more critical.
