Top Generals Worried Trump Would Launch A Coup During Final Days In Office

A new book by a pair of Washington Post reporters claims that top generals, including General Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs, worried that Donald Trump was going to stage some kind of coup in his final days in office. In fact, Milley had gotten a phone call from a friend claiming that this is what the President was planning, according to the book, but Milley was confident that any plans would die in the planning stages. Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins discusses this.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

According to a new book by a pair of Washington Post reporters, Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, the book is called, I Alone Can Fix It, according to this book in the last days of the Trump administration, you know, as we were headed towards January 20th, 2021, where Joe Biden was going to be sworn in, General Mark Milley, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, was actively concerned along with several other top generals that Donald Trump was going to somehow stage a coup in his attempts to stay in the White House. Milley went as far, according to the book, as describing Trump's actions to those reminiscent of Hitler himself, you know, doing whatever he could, whatever he had to do to stay in power. And keep in mind, folks, a lot of this actually took place after January 6th. Okay. After the Capitol riot, insurrection, whatever you want to call it, this was all after that. And that was a time when yes, tensions were high. And honestly, it kind of seems like if January 6th hadn't happened, Trump may have been more inclined to try to stage a coup. That's just my personal opinion here.

But he saw the backlash. He understood that, you know, his supporters got swatted down and then he's facing a second impeachment for it. So yeah, that may have kind of pushed him off the issue a little bit, but the joint chiefs, top military generals were all concerned that this was still something that he had wanted to do, again, according to the book. But Milley says, even though he was concerned about it, even though he was getting phone calls from other generals saying, listen, this is a real possibility. We actually think it's going to happen. Not just that it's a possibility, but we think this is where it's headed. Milley says he was never 100% convinced that even if Trump did it, it would be successful. In fact, he knew if Trump tried to stage some kind of coup the military wouldn't go for it. The military would 100% be against it. And he knew that, of course, because he talks to the top generals on a daily basis. Right. He talks to the joint chiefs. He knows what they know. He knows what they feel. He knows how they would react in this situation, which to be honest was something that a lot of folks at the time had said that even if Trump tried to stage a coup, there is no way in hell the military would go with it.

The January 6th insurrection proved a little of that wrong. A lot of the people that have been arrested are former military, retired military, some active duty military. So we do know, yes, there are plenty of members of the military willing to do whatever Donald Trump tells them to do. Even if he's not their commander in chief, they still view him as their leader, personal leader, essentially. And they were willing to do it. But I think we should all be a little more grateful for the fact that Donald Trump did not launch a q, a coup, excuse me. You know, after hearing all of these stories from the top military brass at the time, understanding that this was something they were actively talking about Trump attempting to do, we should all breathe a sigh of relief that this man never tried It. But at the same time we got to keep our guard up with this guy. We have to make sure that he never gets back in that White House, because if he does, he's going to be more unhinged. He is going to be more unchained.