'Shall we say turkey!' Critics laugh as Trump explodes at 'unflattering' Time cover photo
President Donald Trump has dishonored America through the actions of his top armed forces cabinet officer, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who is openly denigrating Black soldiers.
“Black Americans fought to destroy a white supremacist regime overseas, while living under legalized segregation at home,” wrote Steve Schmidt, who served as an adviser to President George W. Bush, on Sunday. “Their courage exposed America’s contradiction. So did the Japanese American soldiers of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Their families lived behind barbed wire while they fought and died beneath the American flag.”
Yet under Hegseth, the Trump administration has worked to scrub military history of references to heroic individuals like General Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. and is denying promotions to qualified Black officers, thereby "dishonoring" the military, Schmidt argued. Hegseth has even fired people for seemingly no other reason than that they were Black, and has repeatedly implied that when Black officers only received these types of honors by denying them from more qualified white officers.
“The road from Normandy leads to Selma,” Schmidt argued. “The road from Monte Cassino leads to the Voting Rights Act. The road from the skies over Berlin leads directly to an American military where command would increasingly be earned through merit rather than inherited through race.”
He continued, “That transformation didn’t weaken the United States. It made America stronger — not because diversity became a slogan — but because excellence became the standard. The greatest military in the history of mankind became greater when it finally began drawing upon the talents of the entire American people.”
Hegseth’s actions, Schmidt claimed, put this heritage “at risk.”
“When accomplished Black officers are removed, marginalized or publicly disparaged under circumstances that create the appearance that race has become a defining factor, the damage extends far beyond individual careers,” Schmidt said. “Memory is wounded. History is distorted. The sacrifices of generations of Americans are diminished. That isn’t conservatism. It’s historical vandalism.”
He continued, “The United States military has never been great because it belonged to one race. It’s been great because it belonged to the Constitution.”
In addition to being a fierce critic of Trump’s administration, Schmidt has also often set his sights on Trump himself, in particular by pointing out his physical and mental decline in his 80th year of life.
“Vice President Harry Truman was an honest man, but he deceived the country after he had his one and only visit with the 32nd President of the United States Franklin Delano Roosevelt,” Schmidt told his podcast on Wednesday. “He knew that Roosevelt was a dying man and he did die on April the 12th, 1945. He was inaugurated for the fourth and final time on January 20th. This matters because Franklin Roosevelt wasn't seen in public every day quite like Donald Trump is. The images of Roosevelt at Yalta are shocking. The war etched onto his face, old before his time, falling apart. The burden of command weighing heavily.”
He also compared Trump to the Roman emperor Nero.
“Look at his decomposition physically,” Schmidt argued. “He can barely get out of a chair. He's lost with the European leaders who are redirecting him back into the photo. Does it remind you of anyone? A previous president off-derided by Donald Trump for getting lost in similar photo ops?”
He added, “Look at Trump's hands. Look at his ankles. The swelling is obviously attributed to a coronary condition. His words slur. He falls asleep. He is poked and prodded by 22 different medical specialists like he's ET at Walter Reed Army Hospital. All of this is to say, J.D. Vance, his fascist understudy, puppet to Peter Thiel, general weirdo and lover of the couch, may soon be commander in chief. We should talk about this more.”