Tag: Mark Milley

‘Always whispering devilish ideas in the king’s ear’: Gen. Milley had a low opinion of Stephen Miller, new book says

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Gen. Mark Milley appears to not have been a fan of former Trump White House advisor Stephen Miller and thought of him as “a Rasputin character, always whispering devilish ideas in the king’s ear,” according to an excerpt from a new book documenting Trump’s last days in office. 

According to Business Insider, the highlighted excerpt comes from the new book “I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump’s Catastrophic Final Year.”Authored by Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Phillip Rucker, the book sheds light on some of Milley’s concerns, and based on the writers’ reporting, the top-ranking general had shared his concerns about Miller with his aides.

Per the publication:

“Milley likened Miller to the villainous Grigori Rasputin, an influential Russian political figure also called the “Mad Monk,” who held significant influence over the last Tsar, Nicholas II, and his family. The self-professed holy man was later murdered by aristocrats.” Continue reading.

Milley to Trump: “I don’t expect you to understand”

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The new book by The Wall Street Journal’s Michael Bender — “Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost” — pinpoints the moment that the relationship between former President Trump and Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley began to disintegrate.

  • It came last year during a fiery Oval Office confrontation over Milley’s public apology for appearing in a photo op with Trump at St. John’s Church:

“Why did you apologize?” Trump asked him. “That’s weak.”

“Not where I come from,” Milley said. “It had nothing to do with you. It had to do with me and the uniform and the apolitical tradition of the United States military.”

Continue reading.

Trump says Gen. Mark Milley should be ‘court-martialed’ if he thought the former president potentially sought a coup

Former President Donald Trump on Friday said that General Mark Milley should be “court-martialed and tried” if he believed that the former president sought to carry out a coup, referencing an excerpt from a forthcoming book by Washington Post reporters Carol D. Leonnig and Philip Rucker.

Trump has pushed back against the excerpt from “I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump’s Catastrophic Final Year,” which said that Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, discussed the possibility of a coup with friends, legislators, and colleagues.

“The writings within these third-rate books are Fake News, and ‘General’ Milley (who [former Defense Secretary James] Mattis wanted to send to Europe in order to get rid of him), if he said what was reported, perhaps should be impeached, or court-martialed and tried,” the former president said in a statement. “He tries to be a tough guy, which he is not, but he choked beyond belief as soon as a microphone was stuffed in front of his face or, at the mere sight of the Fake News Media.”

Conservative actress rages at top US general for mentioning white rage: We ‘are the least racist’ race

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On Thursday, appearing on the far-right Newsmax network, actress Sam Sorbo raged against Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley for defending the Pentagon’s efforts to research “white rage.”

Milley was happy to explain the Pentagon’s research when questioned by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) — it was, he noted, a critical part of understanding domestic terrorist threats like the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. 

“I’ve read Mao Zedong. I’ve read Karl Marx. I’ve read Lenin. That doesn’t make me a communist. So what is wrong with understanding — having some situational understanding about the country for which we are here to defend?” Milley said. Continue reading.

Joint Chiefs chairman clashes with GOP on race theory, ‘white rage’

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Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley on Wednesday said it was important for service members to understand critical race theory, shooting down assertions by Republican lawmakers that studying the topic was harmful to military cohesion.

In an impromptu and passionate statement, Milley at a House Armed Service Committee hearing rejected the assertion that critical race theory and other such teaching could be damaging, telling lawmakers that “a lot of us have to get much smarter on whatever the theory is.”

“I do think it’s important, actually, for those of us in uniform to be open-minded and be widely read … and it is important that we train and we understand,” Milley said. “I want to understand white rage, and I’m white.” Continue reading.

Trump’s bizarre reason for passing over a top candidate for the Joint Chiefs of Staff revealed in new report

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Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is one of a handful of senior officials to transition from Donald Trump’s presidency to Joe Biden’s.

“He is one of the people who bear the scars of the Trump years,” John Gans, a former Obama administration official told The Washington Post. “That may not be his fault, but that is the fate of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, which was being chairman under Donald Trump.”

The Post’s Missy Ryan published a sprawling profile of Milley this Tuesday, spanning from his climb through the military’s ranks to his current role in the Biden administration. Within the piece, there’s a brief window into Trump’s questionable decision-making process as president. Continue reading.

Scoop: Generals privately brief news anchors, promise no military role in election

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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley held an off-the-record video call with top generals and network anchors this weekend to tamp down speculation about potential military involvement in the presidential election, two people familiar with the call tell Axios.

Why it matters: The nation’s top military official set up Saturday’s highly unusual call to make clear that the military’s role is apolitical, one of the sources said — and to dispel any notion of a role for the military in adjudicating a disputed election or making any decision around removing a president from the White House.

  • Milley told the anchors that the U.S. military would have no role whatsoever in a peaceful transfer of power, one source added.

Top general says no role for military in presidential vote

The U.S. armed forces will have no role in carrying out the election process or resolving a disputed vote, the top U.S. military officer told Congress in comments released Friday.

The comments from Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, underscore the extraordinary political environment in America, where the president has declared without evidence that the expected surge in mail-in ballots will make the vote “inaccurate and fraudulent,” and has suggested he might not accept the election results if he loses. 

Trump’s repeated complaints questioning the election’s validity have triggered unprecedented worries about the potential for chaos surrounding the election results. Some have speculated that the military might be called upon to get involved, either by Trump trying to use it to help his reelection prospects or as, Democratic challenger Joe Biden has suggested, to remove Trump from the White House if he refuses to accept defeat. The military has adamantly sought to tamp down that speculation and is zealously protective of its historically nonpartisan nature. Continue reading.

Trump: Esper, Milley “should be proud” of Lafayette Square walk

Axios logoPresident Trump declined on Friday to say he retains full confidence in Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and said Esper and Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley should have been “proud” to join him on the now-infamous walk across Lafayette Square.

Driving the news: “I personally think they should have done it differently,” Trump told Axios in an interview Friday in the Oval Office. “I think they should be proud to walk alongside of their president for purposes of safety.”

Why it matters: Despite initial indications that he accepted their pushback against him, Trump remains irked by his top military leaders’ public statements. Esper told colleagues he felt deeply uncomfortable being drawn into the photo op at St. John’s church, and Milley publicly apologized for his participation in the episode.