Trump’s own national security picks now believe him ‘delusional’ and ‘a danger to’ the United States
This post was originally published on this site
Yet another constitutional crisis appears to be on our hands: CNN is now reporting that based on “hundreds” of calls between Donald Trump and foreign leaders, multiple of Trump’s own senior officials came to the conclusion that “that the President himself posed a danger to the national security of the United States.”
CNN cites White House and intelligence officials “intimately familiar” with the conversations, and says former top Trump officials “including national security advisers H.R. McMaster and John Bolton, Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and White House chief of staff John Kelly” to conclude “the President was often ‘delusional'” in his conversations with foreign leaders.
That Trump regularly attacked former U.S. presidents on the calls is unsurprising, as is the news that Turkish strongman Recep Erdogan was one of Trump’s most frequent contacts. But Trump “seemed to continually conflate his own personal interests,” especially his re-election, “with the national interest.”
CNN cites one person “familiar” with “almost all” Trump’s calls with foreign leaders who calls Trump’s behavior “‘abominations’ so previous to U.S. national security interests” that “even many senior Republican members” would no longer be able to back Trump. That seems an impossibility: Senior Republican leaders were fully aware of Trump’s extortion of the Ukrainian government when they voted to immunize him from consequences for that act, and it seems a drastic misreading of those leaders for this presumably-conservative figure to believe hearing even “hundreds” of similar acts would result in the now-fascist party abandoning Trump.
The news that seemingly all of Trump’s most celebrated national security officials believed him to be “delusional” and a “danger to the national security of the United States” based on his behavior, and as his “unfitness” for the presidency “on grounds of temperament and incompetence,” is shocking. Not because they believe so: each of these conclusions can be reached from Trump’s own bizarre public behaviors. But because each one of these top officials believes Trump to pose a danger to the nation and has done absolutely nothing about it.
It is impossible to immediately imagine what sort of congressional investigation would even be appropriate here. Numerous national security officials believe Trump to be “delusional” and unfit for office, based on recordings that are no doubt tucked away on the White House’s classified server, but also in recordings kept by each of those other nations, as well. Insanity.