Jake Tapper: 'Trump Stands With Dead, Racist Losers' by Honoring Confederate Commanders
Once again, President Trump has decided to stand with racism and align himself with America’s racist history. With protests sparked nationwide by racist police brutality, a new effort has begun to rename U.S. military bases that are named after confederate officers, but the current president won’t consider the issue. He instead says the movement disrespects the country’s “history as the Greatest Nation in the World.”
This week Trump tweeted, “My Administration will not even consider the renaming of these Magnificent and Fabled Military Installations. Our history as the Greatest Nation in the World will not be tampered with. Respect our Military!”
On Sunday, CNN’s Jake Tapper blasted Trump on the topic. The host first spoke about the lengthy list of military leaders who have recently criticized Trump’s divisiveness during a time of national unrest. He then contrasted that with how the president has lashed out against them while cuddling up to the “traitors” and “losers” of America’s past.
“It has been a rough period for President Trump and the military leaders with his former defense secretary, retired Marine General James Mattis, assailing him for dividing the country — a sentiment given an amen by Trump’s former chief of staff, retired Marine General John Kelly — not to mention criticisms from General Colin Powell, Admiral Bill McRaven, General Martin Dempsey, General John Allen, Admiral Mike Mullen,” Tapper said.
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The CNN host continued, “There is one group of generals, however, that the president is standing firm with, dead racist losers — more specifically, the confederate commanders after whom 10 Army bases are currently named.”
Tapper then addressed the bipartisan support the new effort to rename the bases has garnered. Just this week, the Republican-controlled Senate Armed Services Committee approved a measure to rename military bases that honor confederates.
“Days ago the Pentagon said that they wanted to begin a bipartisan conversation about renaming these 10 bases, but the president shut that down. He wants to continue to honor them,” Tapper said, adding that Trump “wants to continue to honor… men who declared war upon the United States to fight for their right to own and rape and kill Black Americans.”
Tapper said Trump is standing with immoral losers: “These bases were not named after the civil war generals in an attempt at national reconciliation. They were named in the 20th century as a way of honoring the racist lost cause that the generals fought. The keyword in that phrase: lost. They lost. And rightfully so. Their cause was immoral.”
But when Trump was running for president in 2016, he told the country that he only liked winners, saying that John McCain should not be revered because he was captured while serving in Vietnam.
“He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured,” Trump said. Now, however, the president is staking his claim on the losers of the confederacy.
Trump’s counterpart in the 2020 campaign for the presidency, Joe Biden, came out in favor of renaming the bases this week.
“The names affixed to our military installations must honor the diverse heritage of leadership and sacrifice in our country’s history,” Biden said.
Tapper concluded by scorching the current president, saying Trump’s position endorses terrorists.
“It does not take much moral clarity to understand that a good place to start would be for the United States to stop honoring traitors and terrorists,” the host said.
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