Jul 21, 2021 - Politics & Policy

Milley to Trump: "I don't expect you to understand"

Trump and Mark Milley

Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images

The new book by The Wall Street Journal's Michael Bender — "Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost" — pinpoints the moment that the relationship between former President Trump and Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley began to disintegrate.

  • It came last year during a fiery Oval Office confrontation over Milley's public apology for appearing in a photo op with Trump at St. John's Church:
"Why did you apologize?" Trump asked him. "That’s weak."
"Not where I come from," Milley said. "It had nothing to do with you. It had to do with me and the uniform and the apolitical tradition of the United States military."
"I don’t understand that," Trump said. "It sounds like you're ashamed of your president."
"I don’t expect you to understand," Milley said.

Flashback ... Bender reports that former White House chief of staff John Kelly warned Milley not to accept Trump's offer to become Joint Chiefs chairman in December 2018: "I would get as far away from this f------ place as I f------ could."

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