John Kelly strongly — and successfully — dissuaded Trump in February from ordering the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from the Korean Peninsula, @NBCNews reports. This fits with accounts I heard about Trump throwing papers in the Oval, yelling about S.Koreahttps://t.co/JYqiqQHaqjpic.twitter.com/QBo6xHWu5K
This article from CNN sounds like another attempt to create tension between President Trump and John Kelly. It is pretty clear that there are people in the White House that do not like the order Kelly has brought and accusing him of taking shots at Ivanka Trump could be attempt to get the President to remove him:
The decision to send her to South Korea did not sit well with some senior officials in the West Wing, two people familiar with the situation told CNN. The nuclear threat from North Korea and the tensions already boiling across the Korean Peninsula made any US delegation far more than ceremonial.
Kelly was not initially enthusiastic about her South Korea trip, a person close to President Donald Trump said, largely because the visit to the Korean Peninsula was far more than a typical Olympic closing ceremony.
“This isn’t like going to Italy. The stakes are far higher and more complex,” a person close to the President said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive subject of the Trump family.
The concerns of Kelly and others about Ms. Trump — who has little experience in government or diplomacy, and hasn’t played a role in discussions about North Korea — were aired in private, according to people familiar with the matter. Kelly was advised by those closest to him that it would be a losing battle to oppose Ivanka as the delegation’s leader. [CNN]
You can read more at the link, but it wasn’t like she was leading a team to negotiate with the North Koreans. She was sent to attend the closing ceremony of the Winter Olympics which is something she more than capable of doing. It seems to me that Ivanka Trump was best person to send to South Korea to off set the positive media coverage that Kim Yo-jong received during her visit to South Korea. From everything reported Ivanka Trump had a great trip and received positive publicity from the visit.
If you watch anything today, watch what retired General and White House Chief of Staff said at a press conference yesterday. No matter what you think of this whole condolence call controversy this is pretty powerful stuff. Here is an excerpt:
White House Chief of Staff John Kelly.
Invoking the death of his son, a Marine, in Afghanistan, White House chief of staff John Kelly delivered an impassioned defense on Thursday of President Trump’s outreach to families of four Americans recently killed in Niger. Kelly also denounced Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., as “selfish” for criticizing Trump for his message to one soldier’s widow.
“I appeal to America: Let’s not let this, maybe, last thing that’s held sacred in our society: a young man, young woman going out and giving his or her life for our country. Let’s try to somehow keep that sacred,” Kelly said in an unusual appearance in the White House briefing room. “It eroded a great deal yesterday by the selfish behavior of a member of Congress.”
Wilson had said that Trump callously told Myeshia Johnson — whose husband Army Sgt. La David Johnson was killed in an Oct. 4 patrol in Niger — that her husband “knew what he signed up for.” The congresswoman, a Johnson family friend, reportedly overheard parts of the conversation while riding in the same car as the widow. Trump flatly denied that account on Twitter Wednesday and said he had “proof.” The soldier’s mother, Cowanda Jones-Johnson, reportedly said that the president had “disrespected” her family.
But Kelly, a retired Marine general, broadly confirmed Wilson’s account — while explaining that Trump had drawn inspiration from what the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joseph Dunford, told him when Robert Kelly was killed after stepping on a landmine while on patrol in Afghanistan in 2010.
“He said ‘Kell, he was doing exactly what he wanted to do when he was killed. He knew what he was getting into, by joining the Marines — that 1 percent — he knew what the possibilities were, because we’re at war,” Kelly said. “‘When he died, he was surrounded by the best men on this Earth, his friends.’
“That’s what the president tried to say to four families the other day,” Kelly said. “I was stunned when I came to work yesterday morning, and brokenhearted, at what I saw a member of Congress doing. A member of Congress who listened in on a phone call from the president of the United States to a young wife, and, in his way, tried to express that opinion — he was a brave man, a fallen hero. He knew what he was getting himself into, because he enlisted — there was no reason to enlist, he enlisted. And he was where he wanted to be, exactly where he wanted to be, exactly the people he wanted to be with, when his life was taken. That was the message.” [Yahoo News]
You can read more and watch the video at the link. General Kelly definitely provides the needed context of what the President had tried to say. The President probably should have took General Kelly’s advice and not made the call considering the difficulty he can sometimes have articulating what he means. But like General Kelly I was surprised that a member of Congress after something like this happens, the first thing they think of is to find a camera to run in front of to score political points. Then the media deciding to run with it like they have is just as bad. Our political and media culture have definitely hit a new low.
