Ex- GOP Sen. and Defense Secretary Hagel: Trump reportedly calling troops ‘losers’ is ‘despicable,’ fits pattern
Former Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel said Sunday that if President Donald Trump disparaged fallen U.S. soldiers by calling them “losers,” as was reported by The Atlantic and several other news outlets, it was “despicable” and unsuitable for the person in charge of America’s armed forces.
Trump has strongly denied The Atlantic report, based on four anonymous sources, that he called dead and wounded U.S. service members “losers and suckers.” The president told reporters Thursday, “I would be willing to swear on anything that I never said that about our fallen heroes. There is nobody that respects them more.”
Several media outlets, including the Associated Press and Fox News, have since confirmed many of the quotes used in The Atlantic piece.
Hagel, a Vietnam War veteran and two-term Republican senator, told ABC News “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz that if Trump’s reported comments are “real, it’s beneath the dignity of any commander in chief. Truly they’re despicable.”
What we know about The Atlantic report:Trump accused of describing war dead as ‘losers’ and ‘suckers.’ He denies allegations.
Hagel said that while the report was based on anonymous sources, the remarks fit with a pattern of previous statements and actions. He cited Trump’s past comments about the late Sen. John McCain as well as three former military general who served in his own Cabinet: former Secretary of Defense James Mattis, former national security adviser William McMaster and former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly. He also accused the president of using veteran and active-duty troops as political “props.”
“Let’s go back and look at Mr. Trump’s words himself coming out of his own mouth starting in 2016 with what he said about John McCain and what he continued to say about McCain,” Hagel said. “How he degraded the service of Generals Mattis and McMaster and just recently General Kelly. The history of this president over the last three and four years is pretty clear.”
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Hagel also pointed to Trump’s decision not to go to a 2018 ceremony at a military cemetery in France to honor America’s war dead. Trump claimed he was unable to attend because of weather.
“Every other leader went. Every other leader drove. The leaders of France, Germany, Canada,” Hagel said. “And you can go through a litany of past things that he said from his mouth, actions that he’s taken and it corroborates really the Goldberg article in The Atlantic.'”
