Former National Security Adviser John Bolton says President-elect Trump has begun to announce appointments to key roles in the next administration. He said he was asking for “obedience.”
“As I've said before, I don't think loyalty is really the right word,” he said Wednesday on CNN. “I think it's loyalty. That's what President Trump is looking for in his appointees. I think it's obedience.”
He said he was prepared to be a “yes man” for select members of President Trump's cabinet, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Fox News, to agree to implement the priorities the president-elect laid out during his campaign. I wondered if there was.
Asked by Hegseth, a member of the Army National Guard and weekend host of Fox & Friends, if he supported the use of military force against Americans, Bolton replied, “I don't know.”
“I don't know. I would say his military service is very commendable,” he continued, “and the question is whether he will act with his personal integrity and loyalty to the Constitution paramount. That question. I don't know him well enough to know the answer to that question.
The former White House aide also expressed concern about the politicization of the military during the post-war second Trump administration. wall street journal Reported on possible executive order creating a commission to evaluate generals, admirals, and flag officers.
“I think this is a huge mistake,” said Bolton, who has emerged as President Trump's chief critic. I think this is the kind of behavior that should not be tolerated.” The goal is to change the Biden administration's policies in areas that have awakened. ”
“It's absolutely their right to do that, but the way to do it is to tell the military and civilian officials at the Department of Defense that there's a new sheriff in town and the policy has changed and that it's better to work on this project,” he added. .
He later said that the country had “strived for decades and centuries; [the military] I think it's very serious to be apolitical and to jeopardize that. ”
The questions come as the former president has come under intense scrutiny after reportedly praising the loyalty of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler's troops. Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley and former White House chief of staff John Kelly described that conversation in interviews, while also comparing the president-elect to a fascist.
Mr. Bolton said late last month that he had seriously considered the issue and that Mr. Trump was incapable of being a fascist.
“I think his actions alone are problematic enough. To be a fascist, you have to have a philosophy, and Trump doesn't have that,” he told CNN's Caitlan Collins at the time.
