10-06-2023, 02:10 AM
Quote:Former Trump White House chief of staff John Kelly is blasting his onetime boss over disparaging remarks he says the then-president repeatedly made about service members and veterans and for what he called Trump's untruthfulness about his positions on various groups as well as on abortion. In a statement to CNN published Monday, Kelly delivered a scathing criticism of former President Donald Trump while confirming reporting in The Atlantic in 2020 that detailed the comments he made during his presidency. "A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there is nothing in it for them,'" Kelly said of Trump. "A person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because ‘it doesn’t look good for me.’John Kelly confirms Trump privately disparaged U.S. service members and veterans
A person who demonstrated open contempt for a Gold Star family — for all Gold Star families — on TV during the 2016 campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who gave their lives in America’s defense are ‘losers’ and wouldn’t visit their graves in France.” The Atlantic reported that Trump privately made damning statements against U.S. service and veterans, such as the late Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who had been a Vietnam prisoner of war, and former President George H.W. Bush, who was shot down as a Navy pilot in World War II. During a visit to France in 2018 for the centennial anniversary of the end of World War I, Trump also reportedly called Marines who died at Belleau Wood “suckers” and fallen soldiers at Aisne-Marne American Cemetery “losers.” Kelly also slammed Trump as someone "who is not truthful regarding his position on the protection of unborn life, on women, on minorities, on evangelical Christians, on Jews, on working men and women. A person that has no idea what America stands for and has no idea what America is all about."