President Donald Trump slammed former Secretary of Defense James Mattis late on Wednesday after Mattis released a controversial statement about the president’s handling of the violent riots across the country.
“Probably the only thing Barack Obama & I have in common is that we both had the honor of firing Jim Mattis, the world’s most overrated General,” Trump wrote. “I asked for his letter of resignation, & felt great about it. His nickname was ‘Chaos,’ which I didn’t like, & changed to ‘Mad Dog.'”
“His primary strength was not military, but rather personal public relations,” Trump continued. “I gave him a new life, things to do, and battles to win, but he seldom ‘brought home the bacon.’ I didn’t like his ‘leadership’ style or much else about him, and many others agree. Glad he is gone!”
…His primary strength was not military, but rather personal public relations. I gave him a new life, things to do, and battles to win, but he seldom “brought home the bacon”. I didn’t like his “leadership” style or much else about him, and many others agree. Glad he is gone!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 4, 2020
Trump’s remarks come after Mattis said in a statement that he was “angry and appalled” by Trump’s handling of the violent riots.
“The words ‘Equal Justice Under Law’ are carved in the pediment of the United States Supreme Court,” Mattis said. “This is precisely what protesters are rightly demanding. It is a wholesome and unifying demand—one that all of us should be able to get behind. We must not be distracted by a small number of lawbreakers. The protests are defined by tens of thousands of people of conscience who are insisting that we live up to our values—our values as people and our values as a nation.”
Mattis’ claim that the number of violent rioters represents only a “small number of lawbreakers” does not square well with numerous videos that have emerged in recent days from inner cities that show widespread looting, attacks on law enforcement, and the destruction of businesses.
Security expert David Reaboi slammed Mattis’ claim that the protesters want “equal justice under the law,” saying that Mattis was “too stupid to realize ‘equal justice under the law’ is literally the opposite of what the protesters demand.”
Mattis—who was always just a conventional wisdom bot with an excellent press shop—is too stupid to realize “equal justice under the law” is literally the opposite of what the protesters demand. pic.twitter.com/0loTAFv9nS
— David Reaboi (@davereaboi) June 3, 2020
Mattis also attacked Trump for walking across the street and taking photos next to a church, and failed to note in his statement that the church had been, according to law enforcement, deliberately set on fire during a riot the night before.
“Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside,” Mattis said.
Mattis also appeared to compare Trump to Nazi Germany, something that the political Left routinely does, saying:
Instructions given by the military departments to our troops before the Normandy invasion reminded soldiers that “The Nazi slogan for destroying us…was ‘Divide and Conquer.’ Our American answer is ‘In Union there is Strength.’” We must summon that unity to surmount this crisis—confident that we are better than our politics.
Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership. We can unite without him, drawing on the strengths inherent in our civil society. This will not be easy, as the past few days have shown, but we owe it to our fellow citizens; to past generations that bled to defend our promise; and to our children.
Mattis’ assertion that the violent riots are somehow a “consequence of three years” of the Trump administration ignores the fact that the riots started in a Democrat-controlled city and state where officials were slow to arrest the police officer who knelt on George Floyd’s neck and then took insufficient action to maintain law and order as widespread violence gripped the streets of Minneapolis.
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