After Gen. Mark Milley Calls Presence At Lafayette Square Photo Op A ‘Mistake,’ Donald Trump Says It’s ‘Fine’
President Donald Trump seemed to indicate that he’s OK with General Mark Milley’s expression of regret for appearing with him in a photo op in front of St. John’s Church, Fox News reported.
Last week, as George Floyd protests were raging across Washington D.C. and other cities, protesters in and around Lafayette Square were forcibly removed from the area, after which Trump and his team walked from the White House to the nearby church. Once there, Trump posed for photos in front of the historic building while holding a Bible.
One of the people who was with the president that day was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley. Milley has since expressed regret for the incident, as CNN reported.
“I should not have been there. My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics. As a commissioned uniformed officer, it was a mistake that I have learned from, and I sincerely hope we all can learn from it.”
Speaking to “Outnumbered Overtime” host Harris Faulkner, Trump appeared to indicate that he didn’t have an issue with Milley’s statements.
Faulkner asked Trump if he felt that Milley’s pushback was “significant.”
“No, no, I mean, if that’s the way they feel, I think that’s fine,” he said.
He then went on to tout his relationship with the military.
“I have good relationships with the military. I’ve rebuilt our military. I spent two and a half trillion dollars—nobody else did.”
He further claimed that his predecessor, Barack Obama, had “depleted” the military, and referenced equipment that was 50 or 60 years old, and suggested that the military had no ammunition.
“Now, we have the greatest military we’ve ever had,” he said, also referencing his creation of the Space Force.
Milley is not the only senior military leader to have broken with Trump over the use of the military in the wake of the George Floyd protests.
Secretary of Defense Mark Esper has also publicly split with Trump on the use of the military to quell protests. Specifically, Trump reportedly wanted 10,000 active-duty military troops deployed to quell the protests, something that Esper adamantly opposed in a purportedly “heated” Oval Office meeting.
Esper has since ordered an “After Action Review” of the National Guard’s role in the protests, as The Hill reported. It’s a process invoked by the military to determine what (if anything) was done wrong in military action, and what could have been done better.
