On Tuesday, the New York Times and the Atlantic each published stories about Donald Trump’s history of denigrating rank-and-file members of the military and complaints that “his” generals, when he was president, resisted his efforts to use the armed services for his own political and personal benefit. The Atlantic’s piece began with an anecdote about the then president reneging on a promise to pay for the funeral of a female soldier of Mexican ancestry, Vanessa Guillén, who had been murdered at Fort Hood, in Texas:
According to attendees, and to contemporaneous notes of the meeting taken by a participant, an aide answered: Yes, we received a bill; the funeral cost $60,000.
Trump became angry. “It doesn’t cost 60,000 bucks to bury a fucking Mexican!” He turned to his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and issued an order: “Don’t pay it!” Later that day, he was still agitated. “Can you believe it?” he said, according to a witness. “Fucking people, trying to rip me off.”
The Atlantic piece also purports to confirm previous reporting about Trump’s habit of complaining that American generals aren’t as loyal as the military leaders in Hitler’s Germany:
As his presidency drew to a close, and in the years since, he has become more and more interested in the advantages of dictatorship, and the absolute control over the military that he believes it would deliver. “I need the kind of generals that Hitler had,” Trump said in a private conversation in the White House, according to two people who heard him say this. “People who were totally loyal to him, that follow orders.”
The Times piece revolved around an interview with John Kelly, a former four-star general and White House chief of staff. Its themes were similar, with the addition of Kelly saying that he feels that Trump is a fascist.
[Kelly] said that, in his opinion, Mr. Trump met the definition of a fascist, would govern like a dictator if allowed, and had no understanding of the Constitution or the concept of rule of law.
He discussed and confirmed previous reports that Mr. Trump had made admiring statements about Hitler, had expressed contempt for disabled veterans and had characterized those who died on the battlefield for the United States as “losers” and “suckers”—comments first reported in 2020 by The Atlantic.
Representatives of the Trump campaign denied to each publication that the anecdotes discussed in either story had ever occurred. (Guillén’s sister and an attorney representing the family also released statements saying they were satisfied with Trump’s handling of Guillén’s death.)
Somewhat surprisingly, given that they’re so similar to previously reported accounts, the Hitler comments seem to have gotten more attention than Trump’s alleged disgust at the idea that a quote-unquote “Mexican” woman—in fact a native-born American—had received a burial with an upper-class price. Then again, it certainly is unusual to say that you wish the people around you were more like the ones who “followed orders” in Nazi Germany!
Conservative cable pundits have been dislocating their shoulders trying to shrug the matter off. Here’s Fox News:
He wasn’t cognizant of the connection between Hitler’s military and Nazism? That’s supposed to make this better?
And Scott Jennings, who has become CNN’s go-to Trump defender:
This is a reference to pro-Palestine rhetoric, presumably, but whatever—thousands of Hitlers! College Hitlers everywhere, going to classes in big lecture halls, waiting in line outside frat parties, etc. If you had a time machine, would you kill Teen Hitler with a Frisbee?
Late on Wednesday, meanwhile, a former model speaking on a group call organized by a pro–Kamala Harris group alleged that Trump had groped her without her consent in 1993 in the presence of Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender and financial industry figure who died in 2019. The woman, Stacey Williams, said Epstein had introduced her to Trump initially. Williams also furnished the Guardian newspaper with a postcard, featuring handwriting that resembles Trump’s, of his home in West Palm Beach, Florida, which she says he sent her later that year. His campaign denies the allegations.
As to the critical question of how this will affect The Polls, majorities of voters already say that they think Harris is less “divisive” and “more likely to unify the country” as president than is Trump, which means these stories are unlikely to upend the race in a major way. That said, Harris has in recent weeks started emphasizing the idea that Trump is unfit to hold office, a stance that makes sense given her campaign’s reportedly data-driven belief that it can still win more votes from Republican-leaning women who are turned off by Trump’s personality. And if a late-October triple shot of racism, Jeffrey Epstein, and Hitler stuff doesn’t do the trick, what else even could? Don’t answer that question, please!
