Pete Hegseth's mother defends son, saying she wrote email "out of love" that called him "abuser of women"

The mother of Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump's embattled pick for defense secretary, defended her son Wednesday morning in an appearance on Fox News, following reporting on an email she sent to her son years earlier accusing him of being an "abuser of women."

Penelope Hegseth, appearing on "Fox & Friends" Wednesday morning, said her son and his wife at the time were going through a "very difficult divorce" when she wrote the email in 2018,  noting that she wrote it "in haste" and with "deep emotions."

"I wrote that out of love," she said. "And about two hours later, I retracted it with an apology email, but nobody's seen that."