Washington – Former Marine Corps General John Kelly, Donald Trump’s longest-serving White House chief of staff, said in a new interview that Trump prefers a dictatorial approach to government. He occasionally noted that Adolf Hitler “did some good things” and did not like appearing next to the amputee veterans.
Speaking to the New York Times two weeks after Election Day, Kelly shared what he says his former boss said about service members and disabled veterans, and how Kelly thinks the former president would prefer to govern. Kelly said he would never tell Americans who to vote for, but that as Trump’s chief of staff from July 2017 to January 2019, he had a front-row seat to Trump’s reactions, speech habits and actions.
Michael Schmidt of the New York Times asked Kelly if he thinks Trump is a fascist.
“Well, looking at the definition of fascism, it is a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, coercive suppression of opposition, and belief in a natural social hierarchy,” Kelly said . “So in my experience, these are certainly the kinds of things that he thinks would work better when it comes to governing America…Certainly, the former president is in far-right territory, he is certainly authoritarian and admires people who are dictators – he said that, so he certainly falls under the general definition of fascist.”
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Perhaps most troubling for Kelly, as a former military veteran, is that Trump “could never embrace why people should serve the country in uniform,” he said. Schmidt asked whether Trump said more than once that soldiers who die on the battlefield for America are “suckers and losers.”
“Yes,” Kelly responded, saying Trump often dealt with the late Sen. John McCain’s military service. Trump has repeatedly criticized McCain, saying in 2015 that he likes “people who haven’t been captured.”
“He said it sometimes, sometimes unexpectedly, but he could never imagine why people would serve the country in uniform,” Kelly said. ‘What was in it for them? That was a common theme.’
In response to Kelly’s New York Times interview, the Trump campaign said Kelly’s stories have been “debunked” and “fabricated.”
“John Kelly has completely denied himself with these debunked stories that he has concocted because he failed to serve his president well while serving as chief of staff and is currently suffering from a debilitating form of Trump Derangement Syndrome,” said Steven Cheung, Trump campaign communications director. “President Trump has always honored the service and sacrifices of all our military men and women, while Kamala Harris has completely disrespected the families of those who made the ultimate sacrifice, including Abbey Gate 13.”
Kelly said Trump would also say “it doesn’t look good for me” to stand next to veterans who have lost limbs.
“Well, certainly his, he didn’t want to be seen with amputees, amputees who lost their limbs in defense of this country that fought for every American, including him, to protect them, but they didn’t want to be seen with them,” Kelly said. said. “That’s an interesting perspective for a commander in chief.”
“He just said, ‘Look, it doesn’t look good for me,’” Kelly added. “Anyway, I don’t know. Not a psychiatrist. If you’re a psychiatrist, I think you could answer some of these questions, but I’m not.”
Kelly said the former president would also say “occasionally” that Hitler “did some good things too.”
“He remarked more than once, ‘You know, Hitler did some good things too,’” Kelly told him. ‘And of course, if you know the history, I also think he falls short in that. If you know what history was about, it would be pretty hard to argue that he did anything good.”
Kelly also talked about his conversations with Trump about Hitler in a story published by The Atlantic on Tuesday.
Kelly told the Times that Trump “certainly prefers the dictatorial approach to government” and “admires people who are dictators.”
“I think he would love to be just like he was when he was in business: he could tell people to do things and they would do it,” Kelly said, acknowledging that he didn’t know Trump when he was just a businessman before his arrival. enter presidential politics. “And don’t really worry about what was the legality and what wasn’t.”
contributed to this report.
