If what you need is strength, strength is in numbers.
I'm talking about former officials who worked for Donald Trump, especially those in charge of national security, who have refused to come forward publicly and directly to warn voters that he is unfit to be president, even though, as those within the system know well, that is how they feel.
Opinion columnist
Jackie Calmes
Jackie Calmes brings a critical eye to the national political scene. She has decades of experience covering the White House and Congress.
Imagine the power of a pre-election press conference in which a phalanx of Trump’s top advisers stood shoulder to shoulder to deliver that message, each providing firsthand examples of his derelictions of duty. What could better sway the few undecided voters against Trump than former military leaders, on national television, testifying to his disregard for the Constitution, the rule of law, and America’s national interests? President George W. Bush, 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney, and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, among others, should get on board, too. We know what they think of Trump. It’s time to get behind Kamala Harris.
On Monday, 10 retired military officers, including six former generals and two admirals, published a letter In which they not only condemned Trump, but also endorsed Harris as “the best — and only — presidential candidate in this race who is fit to serve as our commander in chief.” Trump, they wrote, “is a danger to our national security and our democracy. His own former national security advisers, defense secretaries, and chiefs of staff have said as much.”
Harris' campaign is exploiting previous and unprecedented criticism from former Trump advisers. She trolled Trump before the debate with a new… advertisement on Fox News, with damning clips from Vice President Mike Pence, former national security adviser John Bolton, former Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley. In the debate, Harris guests Among the participants were two outspoken Trump veterans: White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci and national security official and Pence aide Olivia Troye. And in the debate, she joked: “If you want to really know who the former president is … just ask the people who have worked with him.”
The letter, the announcement, the Harris provocation — all of that is well and good, but we need to hear unambiguously from the White House, Cabinet and military notables who actually saw and talked with Trump regularly. As I have noted before, no president in American history has been so maligned by so many who were once part of his inner circle.
Some, including retired Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, a former White House national security adviser, have written critical books but have otherwise declined to say directly, “Voters, beware!” Others, including Milley and former White House chief of staff John F. Kelly, have been sources of damning books and articles but have mostly remained silent. And still more, including former director of national intelligence and former senator Dan Coats, who Privately worried Critics of Trump, who was in some ways beholden to Russian President Vladimir Putin, have been dead silent (and then there are Trump’s deplorable critics, distinguished by their political party or country, notably former Attorney General William P. Barr and former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, who say they will vote for him anyway because he is the Republican nominee).
McMaster is one of the most reticent and frustrating. Last month, while promoting his latest book, “At War with Ourselves: My Tour of Duty in the Trump White House,” McMaster said CBS News said Trump was “nasty,” refused to prepare, made contrary decisions “just to spite” his advisers, was “addicted to flattery” and fostered “an environment of competitive sycophancy.” It said Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson viewed Trump as a danger to American interests. McMaster said he disagreed, though he did offer to say that Trump “sees in authoritarian leaders,” especially Putin, “the qualities that he wants other people to see in him.” Isn’t that dangerous?
Trump’s actions in encouraging the Jan. 6 attack on Congress and disrupting the peaceful transition of power were “a dereliction of his responsibilities under the Constitution,” McMaster said. But when asked whether Trump is fit to serve again, he demurred: “That’s the decision for the American people to make.” He did not say how he would vote, though he conceded that the chaos he described “does foreshadow what we might expect from a second Trump administration.”
McMaster, the author of books on leadership, should be mobilizing people to hold a press conference. What's stopping him and the rest?
To be fair, the military veterans among them are steeped in a culture of deference to the civilian government and the commander in chief. That weighs heavily against any action that has political overtones. But they served in civilian capacities and saw Trump in ways most Americans couldn’t. It’s their patriotic duty to speak up.
Another possible reason for his reluctance: It is well documented that confronting Trump provokes him to attack, which in turn provokes threats of violence of his most rabid supporters. Romney, the only Republican senator to have voted twice to convict Trump in the impeachment process, last year revealed who spends $5,000 a day on security. Most people, including former government officials, probably can't afford that kind of expense.
There is another disturbing factor. Former Representative Adam Kinzinger, a Republican who has never supported Trump, has spoken with some of the… “boneless wonders” who remain off the scene. “I’m going to spill the beans,” he said on a recent Bulwark podcast: “A lot of these people are making money now, OK?” by, for example, advising private equity firms and defense contractors. If his paymasters fear a vengeful Trump will soon be president, his denunciations of his former boss would make them “a liability.”
But, Kinzinger added, as if addressing the faint-hearted: “You saw this and you really care about the future of the country? I mean, you have to speak up! This is like he most important moment.”
Kinzinger held out hope for last-minute surprises. And we should all hold out hope.
@jackiekcalmes
