Tag: what is Trump doing to the Pentagon

White House fires Pentagon advisory board members, installs loyalists

The board firings come less than a month after President Donald Trump pushed out Defense Secretary Mark Esper.

The White House removed nine members of the Pentagon’s Defense Business Board on Friday and installed people loyal to President Donald Trump in their place, including presidential allies Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie.

The firings marked the latest effort by the Trump administration to clean out the Defense Department in the final weeks of the president’s term.

Members of the board received a brief email from Joshua Whitehouse, the White House liaison to the Department of Defense, that simply said, “if you are receiving this e-mail, your membership on the Defense Business Board has expired or is coming to an end.” Continue reading.

Questions swirl at Pentagon after wave of departures

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Is it a coup, a push to withdraw from Afghanistan or just some petty score settling?

That’s the question that has swirled in defense circles amid a wave of firings and resignations at the Pentagon that saw the ouster of the Defense secretary and installation of several aides seen as loyalists of President Trump.

The shakeup has led Trump’s critics to sound the alarm, with Democratic lawmakers and others fearful of what the Pentagon’s new leadership will try to push through in Trump’s remaining two months in office. Continue reading.