According to Mr. Esper, Mr. Trump looked bolder and more fickle after being acquitted in his first impeachment trial. Mr Espur writes that the selection of staff reflects this reality as Mr Trump has tried to tighten his grip on the executive branch with demands for personal loyalty.
Mr. Trump’s desire was to put 10,000 troops on active duty on the streets of Washington on June 1, 2020, after major protests erupted against police brutality following the murder of George Floyd by police. Mr Trump asked Mr Esper about the protesters: “Can’t you just shoot them?”
Mr Esper described an episode nearly a month earlier during which Mr Trump, whose re-election prospects were altered by his repeated intertwining response to the coronavirus pandemic, behaved so chaotically at a May 9 meeting on China with the Joint Chief of Staff that an officer was worried. The unidentified officer confided to Mr. Esper months later that the meeting prompted him to examine the 25th Amendment, which allows the vice president and cabinet members to remove a president to see what is required and under what circumstances to be used.
Mr Esper wrote that he never believed that Mr Trump’s behavior had risen to the point where he needed to invoke the 25th Amendment. He also seeks to give credit to Mr. Trump where he believes he deserves it. However, Mr. Esper paints a portrait of someone who does not control his emotions or thought process throughout 2020.
Mr Esper singles out officials he considers to be irregular or dangerous influences on Mr Trump, with political adviser Stephen Miller close to the top of the list. He said Mr Miller had suggested sending 250,000 troops to the southern border, claiming a large caravan of migrants was on the way. “The US military does not have 250,000 troops to send to the border for such nonsense,” Mr Esper wrote in response.
In October 2019, after members of the national security team gathered in the Situation Hall to watch the broadcast of the attack that killed Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Mr. Miller proposed to secure the head of the Mr al-Baghdadi drowned her in pig’s blood and dispersed her to warn other terrorists, Mr Esper wrote. That would be a ‘war crime’, Mr Esper said.
Mr Miller flatly denied the episode and called Mr Esper an “idiot”.
Mr Esper also sees Mark Meadows, Mr Trump’s last chief of staff in the White House, as a huge problem for the administration and the national security team in particular. Mr. Meadows often threw out the president’s name when he barked orders, but Mr. Esper made it clear that he was often unsure whether Mr. Meadows was saying what Mr. Trump wanted or what Mr. Meadows wanted.
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