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Donald Trump denied reports Thursday night that he had described the fallen soldiers as fools and losers. Image: keystone
“Fools”: Trump is said to have insulted fallen soldiers – now the president is reacting
This report could still hurt Donald Trump: The generally well-informed magazine The Atlantic wrote on Thursday that the US president had made disparaging remarks about the downed soldiers. “Fake News!”: The president denies this representation, but the favor of the military seems to be leaning towards Joe Biden’s side.
It was in mid-November 2018 when Donald Trump was in France to celebrate the centenary of the end of the First World War. The Americans played a key role in ensuring that Germany and its allies could be tied down at the time. But the loss of the Americans was great, many soldiers did not survive their deployment in Europe.
Approximately 1,800 Marines died at the Battle of Belleau Wood when they stopped the advance of German soldiers during the spring offensive in Paris. Today they are buried in the Aisne Marne cemetery, near the French capital.
Trump should have visited this resting place in November 2018. But the trip never took place, the president canceled the visit. Officially, the White House blamed bad weather. Even then, this reason was strongly questioned, especially since a variant of bad weather is usually set up when US presidents travel.
The explosive report from “The Atlantic”
Now, two years later, The Atlantic magazine reports that Trump canceled the trip not because of the rain, but because of his attitude toward the fallen soldiers. Why should I go to this cemetery? He’s full of losers, ”Trump is said to have told his entourage, according to well-informed sources. The president is said to have called the 1,800 soldiers who died in the war “idiots,” for example “idiots.”
He is also said to have asked who the “good guys” were in the 1918 war. He does not understand why the United States rushed to help the Allies.
The magazine also reports that Trump called John McCain, who died in August, a “loser.” “We certainly will not pay for this loser’s funeral,” the president is said to have said.
As a reminder, Republican John McCain spent more than five years in prison in North Vietnam. Donald Trump, on the other hand, was suspended from military service. He alleged health problems.
But that’s not all: according to “The Atlantic,” Trump is said to have accompanied his future chief of staff, John Kelly, to the cemetery where his son is buried. He was killed in a military operation in Afghanistan. While standing by the son’s grave, Trump is reported to have told Father Kelly: “I just don’t get it. What did they get out of it? “
A friend of Kelly’s told “The Atlantic” that Trump doesn’t understand how something can be done if he doesn’t personally benefit from it. These people are “idiots” to Trump. “Trump cannot imagine the pain of another person. That’s why he said something like that to the father of a Marine who fell on Memorial Day in the cemetery. “
Trump fights back …
Donald Trump denied the report Thursday night. He called it a “disgrace” and the sources “scum.” Earlier, White House spokeswoman Alyssa Farah said: “This report is incorrect. President Trump highly values the military. “
On Friday, Trump repeated and claimed on Twitter that “The Atlantic” was “dying” and therefore was making up stories.
That’s what “business as usual” refers to in American politics. But a statement from Trump, which he made Thursday night, is now flying around his ears. He tweeted that he never called John McCain a “loser.”
… and is condemned for the lie
A blatant lie, as it turned out only a little later. It didn’t take long for the Twitter community to unearth a video and tweet in which Trump had done exactly what he previously vehemently denied.
Donald Trump shared an article on Twitter in 2015 in which he described McCain as a “loser.” screenshot: Twitter
Reactions of Trump’s opponents
Needless to say, shortly before the election, the report will cause a stir. Trump’s opponent, Joe Biden, said the president’s words were “sick.” His campaign team posted a video citing the president’s remarks. Message from Joe Biden: “Mr. President, if you don’t respect our troops, you can’t lead them.”
“This is shocking, even for Trump,” said former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.
A video of a retired general received more than 2.5 million views. According to this report, you would be surprised if someone in the military did not consider Trump a “fool” and a “loser,” complains the angry retiree.
Will the report hurt Trump?
That is, of course, difficult to say. Trump will believe the president and label the story “fake news.”
And yet: Trump appears to be losing more and more support in the military. In a recent Military Times poll, just over half of soldiers said they were currently voting for Joe Biden.
The U.S. Army has lost confidence in Trump for the past four years. screenshot: militarytimes
For comparison: in August 2016, a few months before the last elections, preferences in the military were distributed very differently. At the time, 40 percent of those polled said they would vote for Trump, only 20 percent wanted to vote for Hillary Clinton.
So you could say that Trump is not as popular in the military today as Republican candidates were in the past, says Peter Feaver, a former adviser to George W. Bush, in the Military Times. Says the political science professor, “The bottom line is that Trump 2020 cannot claim to have overwhelming support in the military.”
The Atlantic report is unlikely to have helped you in this regard.
