In Newport News speech, Hegseth calls for faster delivery of war ships

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth underscored the Trump administration’s push for faster ship delivery, tighter cost discipline and changes in how the Pentagon works with major defense contractors during a speech Monday at Newport News Shipbuilding.

He spoke for about 20 minutes to a crowd of roughly 300 shipyard workers and sailors in front of the Virginia-class submarine Oklahoma, just days after U.S. forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, an operation Hegseth called an example of restored U.S. “deterrence.”

Maduro and Flores pleaded not guilty Monday in a New York City federal court to narcotics charges, following the Trump administration’s capture of the couple over the weekend, a military action that took members of Congress by surprise and yielded criticism from Democrats, including Virginia’s U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner, who called for the administration to clarify its intentions in Venezuela.

Despite the international headlines, Hegseth’s speech Monday focused primarily on military readiness, fiscal responsibility and the federal government’s partnership with defense contractors like Huntington Ingalls Industries, NNS‘ parent company. He also spoke bluntly about “reviving the warrior ethos” in the U.S. military and ending diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Military members’ “sole purpose is to be the most lethal fighting force on the planet,” Hegseth said. “So no more DEI, no more dudes in dresses, no more distractions. We’re done with that shit.”

Hegseth added that “the best equipment, training and leadership” are necessary for the nation’s troops. “You’re seeing historic investments [of] over a trillion dollars in the last budget, you’ll see even more, and it isn’t just in platforms, it is in people.”

However, he noted, “the days of cost-plus contracts for programs that are years behind schedule are finished. We will give longer, larger, more predictable contracts to companies that deliver on time and on budget, companies that invest in their people, that invest in more capability and more capacity, not companies that invest in stock buybacks or CEO salaries or more dividends.”

On Dec. 22, 2025, Trump, Hegseth and Secretary of the Navy John Phelan announced their intent to construct a new class of American-designed battleships “that will be the most lethal surface combatant ever constructed,” according to a statement.

An HII spokesperson confirmed that the company’s Ingalls Shipbuilding division will be involved in the early design and engineering of the USS Defiant, the first in a new class of large surface combatants that the Navy is calling “the golden fleet.” The new ship will be the first guided-missile battleship capable of deploying nuclear and hypersonic missiles. The Navy doesn’t expect construction on the ship to begin until the 2030s.

While Hegseth did not mention the USS Defiant by name during his Newport News speech, he referenced the “golden fleet” and described it as an effort to revitalize the U.S. maritime industrial base. He said the new fleet is “a declaration to the world that our command of the sea is and will remain non-negotiable.”

Hegseth also used the speech to emphasize what he described as a shift away from a reactive military, which he said is why the Trump administration has rebranded the “Department of Defense” to the “Department of War,” although Trump’s executive order does not change the department’s legal name.

“Not because we seek war, but because we truly understand that in order to ensure peace, we need to be prepared to deter war and, if necessary, decisively win it,” he said. “Our purpose is not to be reactive, but to be dominant, so that no enemy, any enemy, will ever attempt to challenge the United States of America.”

During the speech, Hegseth emphasized that skilled tradespeople and engineers at Newport News Shipbuilding are essential to the United States’ warfighters.

“We’re holding your leadership accountable,” he told the workers. “We’re holding your leadership’s feet to the fire. Their jobs are on the line to ensure that you can deliver what America needs, that your craftsmanship is unleashed, that you are taken care of, that you are paid properly, that your work is done safely, that we can move at speed and at scale.”

The Trump administration’s emphasis on shipbuilding comes amid concerns about the weakness of the U.S. shipbuilding base compared with competitors like China, which now accounts for more than half of global shipbuilding output and as much as 75% of new ship orders. CNBC reports that outdated infrastructure and workforce shortages are obstacles to expanding production of commercial vessels and Navy ships.

According to the Virginia Economic Development Partnership, Newport News Shipbuilding is one of only two shipyards capable of designing and building nuclear-powered submarines.

Earlier Monday, Hegseth witnessed NNS employees executing serial module production for both Columbia- and Virginia-class submarines, and he toured these submarines at various stages of construction. His visit was part of the administration’s broader “Arsenal of Freedom” tour, which the Trump administration says is “a call to action to revitalize America’s manufacturing might and re-energize the nation’s workforce.”

“Speed matters,” HII CEO and President Chris Kastner said in a statement. “Over the past year, in partnership with our government customers, we’ve taken steps to measurably increase our hiring, grow our retention and most importantly, improve proficiency levels within our workforce. These actions are yielding a meaningful increase in shipbuilding throughput.”

With more than 40 ships at Ingalls and NNS under construction or undergoing modernization, Kastner says the company’s focus in 2026 is to build on this momentum.

To increase shipbuilding throughput and meet increased demand for ships, HII said in a news release that it has launched a distributed shipbuilding initiative to improve schedule adherence by partnering with 23 shipyards and fabricators beyond its traditional labor market.

The company said it has also formed partnerships with international manufacturers to explore ways to expand capacity, including evaluating adding an additional shipyard in the U.S.

A subsidiary of Fortune 500 contractor Huntington Ingalls Industries, NNS is the state’s largest industrial employer, employing about 26,000 people, and in 2024, the division hired about 3,000 more workers, part of an overall goal of hiring 16,000 more in the next decade to fulfill Navy shipbuilding needs. With 44,000 employees, HII is the largest industrial employer in Virginia and Mississippi.