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Prominent figures recognized the anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack in a variety of ways, but The Hill took note of striking comments from one of Donald Trump’s former cabinet secretaries.
Mark Esper, the former U.S. Secretary of Defense, said former President Trump is a “threat to democracy” on the third anniversary of the Capitol riot. “And yes, I do regard him as a threat to democracy, democracy as we know it, our institutions, our political culture, all those things that make America great and have defined us as, you know, the oldest democracy on this planet,” Esper told CNN’s Jim Acosta on Saturday.
As best as I can tell, this generated very few headlines, perhaps because Esper has publicly criticized his former boss before. In November 2022, for example, the former Pentagon chief described Trump as “unfit for office.”
I’ve long believed, however, that calling someone a “threat to democracy” represents a unique condemnation. As we’ve discussed, officials are routinely targeted with all kinds of rebukes about their competence and integrity, but for a former president’s Defense secretary to say that he represents “a threat to democracy” is to argue that our system of government may no longer endure if that leader holds a position of influence.
What’s more, it was a month earlier when Esper spoke to MSNBC’s Katy Tur about the tensions between him and Trump that arose in June 2020, “when he wanted to deploy active-duty troops on the street in Washington, D.C., and suggested actually that we shoot Americans in the streets.”
There are plenty of examples in American history of presidents clashing with assorted members of their teams, but the former Defense secretary’s rhetoric about the former president isn’t normal. When Esper talks about Trump — on the Jan. 6 anniversary and before — he appears to be describing a man he considers to be a dangerous maniac.
And that’s the sort of thing that should probably be a bigger deal as Republican voters choose their next presidential nominee.
Esper is not just some random observer. Trump tapped him to lead the Department of Defense. Esper worked with the Republican for a year and a half, giving him a front-row seat on how Trump thinks, listens, processes information, evaluates evidence, and makes decisions.
It’s against this backdrop that the former DOD secretary is practically begging Americans to recognize just how significant a threat to national security Trump is.
If Esper were alone, he might be easier to dismiss, but as regular readers know, the likely GOP nominee has faced condemnations from an amazing number of officials from his own team. The list includes several former members of the White House Cabinet — the Republican’s former chief of staff can barely contain his visceral contempt for the former president — and it grows much longer if we include other officials who worked with Trump just below the Cabinet level.
History offers plenty of examples of presidents who’ve clashed with one aide or another, but we’ve never seen anything like this.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.