Pete Hegseth, Elise Stefanik and Matt Gaetz are among those who were either confirmed or reported to be targeted

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Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s defense secretary pick, was among several cabinet nominees and appointees of the president-elect’s incoming administration who were targeted with bomb threats and so-called “swatting” on Wednesday, the Guardian has learned.

Elise Stefanik, a Republican congresswoman of New York and Trump’s pick for US ambassador to the United Nations, who has emerged as a hard-right loyalist of Trump in the last few years, was the subject of a bomb threat, her office said.