Erik De La Garza
October 22, 2024
Gen. John Kelly (Wikimedia Commons) and Donald Trump (AFP)
Former Marine General John Kelly, who also served as Donald Trump’s longest-running chief of staff, blasted his old boss in interviews with the New York Times, spurred by the former president’s recent threats to use the military on the “enemy from within.”
“I think this issue of using the military on — to go after — American citizens is one of those things I think is a very, very bad thing — even to say it for political purposes to get elected — I think it’s a very, very bad thing, let alone actually doing it,” Kelly told the Times in the wide-ranging interview that hit on topics from Trump’s “lack of understanding of history and the Constitution” — to his speaking "positively of Hitler."
Kelly told the newspaper that his former boss “met the definition of a fascist, would govern like a dictator if allowed, and had no understanding of the Constitution or the concept of rule of law.”
He confirmed reports that Trump “made admiring statements about Hitler, had expressed contempt for disabled veterans and had characterized those who died on the battlefield for the United States as 'losers' and 'suckers' — comments first reported by The Atlantic.”
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Kelly said that Trump is the only president in his lifetime to notderstand American values and reject the Constitution.
“He just doesn’t understand the values — he pretends, he talks, he knows more about America than anybody, but he doesn’t,” Kelly said, according to the publication.
He added in the interviews that denials by Trump and his aides regarding the former president reportedly referring to injured and killed service members as “losers and suckers” were false.
“The time in Paris was not the only time that he ever said it,” Kelly told the Times. He continued: "Whenever John McCain’s name came up, he’d go through this rant about him being a loser, and all those people were suckers, and why do you people think that people getting killed are heroes?”
“He just doesn’t understand the values — he pretends, he talks, he knows more about America than anybody, but he doesn’t,” Kelly said, according to the publication.
He added in the interviews that denials by Trump and his aides regarding the former president reportedly referring to injured and killed service members as “losers and suckers” were false.
“The time in Paris was not the only time that he ever said it,” Kelly told the Times. He continued: "Whenever John McCain’s name came up, he’d go through this rant about him being a loser, and all those people were suckers, and why do you people think that people getting killed are heroes?”
'Surely you can’t mean Hitler’s generals?' John Kelly opens up about Trump's shocking ask
Matthew Chapman
October 22, 2024
Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump makes a campaign speech at the Johnny Mercer Theatre Civic Center in Savannah, Georgia, U.S. September 24, 2024. REUTERS/Megan Varner/File Photo
Former President Donald Trump's one-time chief of staff retired Marine Gen. John Kelly told The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg more details about the infamous exchange in which he demanded Kelly act more like the generals for Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
Kelly, who also served as Trump's Homeland Security secretary and has become increasingly outspoken against the former president since leaving the administration, has previously revealed Trump's obsession with Hitler.
Peter Baker and Susan Glasser's book, The Divider: Trump in the White House, has already detailed that Trump asked Kelly, “Why can’t you be like the German generals?” at a moment when he was frustrated over his lack of full compliance from the military on every scheme he wanted to do. Kelly told Trump that Hitler's generals actually “tried to kill Hitler three times and almost pulled it off,” which Trump didn't believe, saying, “No, no, no, they were totally loyal to him.”
Kelly had a bit more detail to add in his conversation with Goldberg.
Specifically, Kelly, said Goldberg, "told me that when Trump raised the subject of 'German generals,' Kelly responded by asking, '‘Do you mean Bismarck’s generals?’' He went on: 'I mean, I knew he didn’t know who Bismarck was, or about the Franco-Prussian War. I said, ‘Do you mean the kaiser’s generals? Surely you can’t mean Hitler’s generals? And he said, ‘Yeah, yeah, Hitler’s generals.’ I explained to him that [Erwin] Rommel had to commit suicide after taking part in a plot against Hitler.' Kelly told me Trump was not acquainted with Rommel."
Many of the former military officials who held high positions in Trump's administration have warned they believe he is unfit for office — a point that Vice President Kamala Harris frequently brings up in interviews, debates, and elsewhere on the campaign trail.
The story concludes the recorded, on-the-record interview series by saying that Kelly had “nothing good to say about Mr. Trump.”
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