PoliticoEx-US defence chief James Mattis goes after Trump: the president ‘tries to divide us’

This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Lara Seligman and Daniel Lippman on politico.com on June 3, 2020

Former US Defence Secretary James Mattis broke his silence on the conduct of President Donald Trump on Wednesday, blasting him and top military leaders and saying he is “angry and appalled” with the events of the past week.

“Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people – does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership,” Mattis said in a statement sent to reporters.

This marked Mattis’ first public criticism of his former boss since the retired Marine Corps general resigned in late 2018 over Trump’s decision to pull US troops from Syria.

While he did not cite any other officials by name, Mattis harshly criticised Pentagon leaders, including Defence Secretary Mark Esper, for their handling of the military response to race-related protests across the country.

Even as Esper reversed a decision to send home active-duty troops on alert to respond to unrest in the national capital region on Wednesday, Mattis argued for deploying the military at home only on “very rare occasions”, and only at the request of state governors.

“We do not need to militarise our response to protests. We need to unite around a common purpose,” he wrote.

He cited Esper’s decision to pose in a “bizarre photo op” outside St. John’s Episcopal Church in Washington DC, after Attorney General Bill Barr ordered the clearing of protesters on Monday night. Esper said on Wednesday that he hadn’t known ahead of time that the photo op was happening.