Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance (OH) on Thursday pushed back against John Kelly’s remarks describing former President Donald Trump as “an authoritarian” and someone who fits the “general definition of fascist.”
Vance in 2016 wrote in a Facebook group that he feared Trump might be “America’s Hitler.” But this week he defended his running mate, saying Kelly’s accusations are the words of a “disgruntled ex-employee.”
“Here’s the thing about what John Kelly said. John Kelly was fired by Donald Trump and he’s pissed off about it and he wont stop talking about it,” Vance said during a rally in Michigan when asked about Kelly’s recent remarks. “Every time that John Kelly said that something happened you’ve got three or four people who were allegedly in the room when it happened saying he’s making it up.”
“So who do we believe?” the Ohio senator asked. “Do we believe multiple eyewitnesses or do we believe a disgruntled ex-employee? I believe the multiple eyewitnesses. I think everything that John Kelly said is not true.”
Numerous other staffers have confirmed Kelly’s remarks and shared his diagnosis.
Two other generals who served in his administration, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley and former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, have also described Trump as an authoritarian and suggested he is a fascist.
Vance at his rally also accused Vice President Kamala Harris and her campaign of directing Kelly, Trump’s former chief of staff and Homeland Security secretary, on what to say.
“John Kelly did not come out of his own volition. I guarantee he talked to someone on Kamala Harris’ campaign beforehand,” Vance said. “And we gotta ask ourselves, why are the media and, most importantly, why is Kamala Harris talking about a disgruntled former employee instead of the fact that under her leadership grocery prices were up 25 percent in the state of Michigan?”
Vance’s insistence that Trump’s accusers are wrong comes in the wake of a recent on-the-record interview Kelly did with the New York Times.
“Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators — he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure,” Kelly said.
In a separate interview with the Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg, Kelly offered more details from his time working for the former president.
“I need the kind of generals that Hitler had,” Trump said, according to Kelly. “People who were totally loyal to him, that follow orders.”
Kelly also said that Trump used the terms “suckers” and “losers” to describe soldiers who gave their lives defending the country on multiple occasions.
“Vietnam would have been a waste of time for me. Only suckers went to Vietnam,” he said during his presidency, according to Kelly, who served as Trump’s chief of staff from 2017 to 2019.
Meanwhile, in response to Vance’s accusations, the Harris campaign said in a statement that the senator knows “the truth about Trump’s dangerous disregard for the rule of law and his desire to wield unchecked power against his fellow Americans.”
“Vance’s public outbursts aren’t going to change the fact that those who know Trump best are warning all Americans that he’s a threat to our democracy — and that he would be even more dangerous in a second term,” Democratic National Committee spokesperson Alex Floyd said in a statement, according to Politico.
On Friday morning, 13 former Trump staffers put out a letter of support for Kelly, agreeing with his assessment. “Everyone should heed General Kelly’s warning. We have witnessed, up close and personal, how Donald Trump operates and what he is capable of,” the former officials wrote.
“The American people deserve a leader who won’t threaten to turn armed troops against them, won’t put his quest for power above their needs, and doesn’t idealize the likes of Adolf Hitler,” they continued. “Donald Trump demonstrates every day he is not capable of being commander in chief of this great nation.”
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