'Founding fathers' worst nightmare': Ex-defense sec warns of second Trump term
Former President Donald Trump is antithetical to the Constitution and the framers' vision of how the American military should operate, argued former Defense Secretary William Cohen on CNN Thursday.
This comes after a new article in The Atlanticrevealed the extreme measures Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley and several other military officials had to take to avert the former president's worst impulses.
"This article quotes General Milley as telling friends that if Donald Trump wins back the White House, quote, 'He'll start throwing people in jail, and I'd be at the top of the list,'" said anchor John Berman. "The piece also says, quote, 'At one point during the presidency, Trump proposed calling back to active duty two retired flag officers who had been critical of him, Admiral William McRaven and General Stanley McChrystal, so they could be court-martialed. What goes through your mind when you hear all this?"
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"I think we have a lot to fear with a possible re-election or election of Donald Trump," said Cohen. "Donald Trump is the founding fathers' worst nightmare, a man who has no moral character, has no general understanding of the rule of law or respect for the rule of law. And he is someone who is trying to get absolute power by undermining every institution in our government. So he's the nightmare of the founding fathers, and that's what the Chairman had to deal with."
"And thank goodness he stayed on," Cohen added. "He could have retired, or just said, I can't stand it anymore, and that would have created a much more dangerous situation for our allies and our adversaries looking at us saying, wow, the United States really is unstable with an unstable person. That could have been the most dangerous thing for him to have done. So he stayed there and he negotiated his way to be the principle adviser of the President of the United States and the person who worried the most about how erratic, unstable and dangerous he really is."
Pressed by Berman, Cohen said he believes Trump would imprison Gen. Milley and like-minded military officials if given the presidency again. "I think he will do what he says," said Cohen. "He has no respect for the rule of law. He does not believe the law applies to him and anything he might do."
Watch the video below or at the link here.
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