Then-National Security Adviser John Bolton in an interview Aug. 27, 2019, with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (video screenshot)
John Bolton is no friend of Donald Trump, but the president's former national security adviser on Friday disputed the anonymously sourced story by The Atlantic claiming Trump called fallen World War I soldiers "losers" and "suckers."
"I didn't hear that," Bolton told the New York Times. "I'm not saying he didn't say them later in the day or another time but I was there for that discussion."
The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg, in a story titled "Trump: Americans Who Died in War Are 'Losers' and 'Suckers,'" also claimed Trump skipped a 2018 visit to a cemetery near Paris where American service members are buried because he didn't want to ruin his hair.
White House press secretary Kaylie McEnaney said Friday there are 10 on-the-record sources "debunking" the claims of four anonymous sources.
"The liberal activists at The Atlantic are uninterested in the truth ... they are only interested in peddling conspiracy-laden propaganda," she said.
"The liberal activists at the Atlantic are uninterested in the truth ... they are only interested in peddling conspiracy-laden propaganda." - @PressSec pic.twitter.com/v2ZtYR5yWI
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) September 4, 2020
Bolton confirmed in his controversial book "The Room Where it Happened" that the cancellation was weather-related. He explained weather didn't permit a helicopter trip, and the possibility of being stuck in road traffic was an "unacceptable risk."
After a speech Friday in Wilmington, Delaware, a reporter for The Atlantic asked Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden to react to the magazine's claims.
Biden was asked what he thought the alleged remarks tell him about Trump's "soul and the life he leads."
"I'm going to try to be measured in my response," Biden began. "If it's true -- and based on the other things he's said, I believe it's true -- I'd ask you all the rhetorical question: How do you feel? How would you feel if you had a kid in Afghanistan right now? How would you feel if you lost a son, daughter, husband, wife? How would you feel, for real?" he said.
"I've never been as disappointed in my whole career with a leader I've worked with -- president or otherwise," Biden said. "It is absolutely damnable. It is a disgrace."
Trump vehemently denied the claim when he arrived from a rally in Pennsylvania last night, noting Gen. Keith Kellog "couldn't believe when he heard it, and he knows all of it."
"To think that I would make statements negative to our military and our fallen heroes, when nobody's done what I've done, with the budgets, with the military budgets, with getting payraises for our military," he told reporters.
"It is a disgraceful situation, by a magazine that is a terrible magazine," Trump said.
The president speculated that the anonymous sources were "people in the administration that I got rid of."
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