President Donald Trump took to social media Tuesday to announce that he’d instructed his Defense secretary to scale back the United States’ annual military exercise with South Korea in a near-identical post to one he made more than a week ago.
Trump first made the announcement on Aug. 16, but on Tuesday, Aug. 25, issued a near-identical statement with four inconsequential alterations, such as changing the tense of verbs. The odd post comes amid new revelations that Trump’s social media posts are often written by Natalie Harp, his 35-year-old female aide whose unusually close relationship with the president has unsettled the White House, earning her the nickname of Trump’s human "binky."
Trump sparked uproar last week when he first announced that the annual joint military exercise with South Korea would be scaled back, an exercise that has been conducted for more than 70 years. Former chief of staff at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned that the move could very well invite “the next Pearl Harbor” by weakening the United States’ relationships.