Top General Was Told to Shut Down Kid Rock Probe Before Pete Hegseth Fired Him

Kid Rock found himself at the center of a clash inside the Pentagon after army helicopters made an unauthorized low-altitude flyby over his Tennessee property earlier this year.

According to a report published Wednesday, August 26, by The Washington Post, then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George wanted the military to continue investigating whether safety rules had been violated when two AH-64 Apache helicopters flew over Kid Rock’s estate outside Nashville on March 28.

The musician, 55, whose real name is Robert Ritchie, posted a video of the helicopters on X and used the moment to take a shot at California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a frequent critic of President Donald Trump. “This is a level of respect,” Kid Rock wrote, that Newsom “will never know.”

Kid Rock has been an outspoken supporter of the president, 80, and has appeared alongside him at events. He has also embraced Trump-aligned political events, headlining Turning Point USA’s All-American Halftime Show in February as a conservative alternative to Bad Bunny‘s Super Bowl LX performance. In May, the performer kicked off his Freedom 250 Tour — The Road To Nashville, a 10-stop tour celebrating America’s 250th anniversary, in Dallas.

Within three days of the flyby, the pilots involved had been grounded and the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell had opened an administrative investigation, the outlet reported. The probe quickly became a point of contention at the highest levels of the military.

According to the report, three people familiar with the matter said that shortly before George was removed from his position, fellow Gen. Chris LaNeve advised him against pursuing the investigation. One source said LaNeve, 59, told George, 61, that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not want it to continue, while two others said George later told colleagues that LaNeve had suggested the review should be dropped.

George nevertheless believed the Army should follow its normal procedures and determine whether any safety regulations had been broken, according to The Washington Post. However, Hegseth, 46, ultimately shut down the investigation, per the report, and cleared the aircrews, publicly encouraging them to “Carry on, Patriots.”

According to the article, on April 2, Hegseth abruptly removed George as Army chief of staff, cutting short a term that had been expected to run until 2027. Hegseth and his advisers have not publicly identified a specific reason for George’s dismissal.

The Kid Rock connection did not end there: Per the report, a few weeks after the investigation was halted, Hegseth and the musician flew aboard Apache helicopters during an event at Fort Belvoir in Virginia. A Pentagon spokesman explained that the flights were part of a broader community relations event, the outlet reported.

Hegseth did not directly address the conversation between George and LaNeve. Instead, in a statement to the outlet, he defended LaNeve, calling him “precisely the kind of leader the U.S. Army needs right now” and a “back-to-basics, no politics, no-nonsense General.”

Hegseth’s spokesman, Sean Parnell, dismissed the newspaper’s new reporting as a “regurgitating” of a “tired, old story simply to manufacture drama,” according to The Washington Post.

LaNeve has served as acting Army chief of staff since George’s firing and is being considered to take over the position permanently.

As National Enquirer previously reported, Kid Rock has also gotten close to other members of Trump’s Cabinet. In February, the rocker teamed up with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for a bizarre shirtless workout video, posted to Instagram, promoting Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” agenda. The pair lifted weights, played pickleball, did push-ups in a sauna and took a cold plunge together as Kid Rock’s 1998 hit “Bawitdaba” played in the background.