Former Trump White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany on Thursday refuted former Obama State Department spokesperson Marie Harf’s claim that former President Donald Trump called veterans “suckers” and “losers.”
Trump departed his bulletproof glass encasement to embrace a supporter who experienced a medical issue during his Wednesday outdoor rally. Harf, on “Outnumbered,” said moments like the hug are eclipsed by instances where Trump has made objectionable remarks, including about the military, but McEnany said she believes it is blatantly false that the former president disrespected veterans.
“For every one of those compassionate moments, we have moments where President Trump calls military veterans who have died in the line of duty or gotten injured ‘suckers’ and ‘losers,’ where he says awful things about people who have died for their country in service of their country, where he says terrible things about women in politics, sexist, awful misogynist things,” Harf said. “So I agree that that was a nice moment. For those of us who have worked with Secret Service, every time the president does something that is not planned, it is nerve-racking for them, especially after what President Trump has been through.”
The Atlantic published a story in September 2020 citing anonymous sources asserting Trump called off a 2018 visit to a French cemetery where American troops are buried, declaring that they were “suckers” and “losers.” However, the credibility of the story has been refuted, with former national security adviser John Bolton denying Trump uttered these words and saying the former president did not go to the cemetery for weather and security reasons.
“[Marie] mentioned the ‘suckers’ and ‘losers’ alleged comments … I have never, in my entire time working around Trump, ever heard him disparage a member of the military, a fallen person who died for this country, ever,” McEnany responded. “And, in fact, I worked on the response to that story and collected dozens of people in the administration who had been there since day one who said that never happened. So that is reporting — not confirmed and unconfirmed. And I could say an outright lie based on my experience.”
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