Trump Is Obsessed With Having a Dictator-Level Military

From the waning days of Donald Trump’s administration and beyond, the former president has been obsessed with the executive advantages of dictatorship.

A new report by The Atlantic found that, in private, Trump had openly praised the authoritarian setup of some of history’s greatest villains, including Adolf Hitler.

“I need the kind of generals that Hitler had,” Trump said in a private conversation in the White House, according to two sources that spoke anonymously with The Atlantic. “People who were totally loyal to him, that follow orders.”

While in a frustrated discussion with then–Chief of Staff John Kelly, a former Marine general, Trump reportedly asked, “Why can’t you be like the German generals?” forgetting that Hitler’s top generals had themselves defied him and made several attempts toward the end of World War II to kill him. Kelly, trying to correct the president, informed him that German generals “tried to kill Hitler three times and almost pulled it off.”

But Trump wouldn’t hear of it. “No, no, no, they were totally loyal to him,” the president responded, according to Peter Baker and Susan Glasser’s 2022 book, The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021.

When asked by The Atlantic about the exchange for the story published Tuesday, Kelly recalled that when Trump had raised the matter of “German generals,” Kelly responded by asking, “Do you mean Bismarck’s generals?”

“I mean, I knew he didn’t know who Bismarck was, or about the Franco-Prussian War. I said, ‘Do you mean the kaiser’s generals? Surely you can’t mean Hitler’s generals?’” Kelly told The Atlantic. “And he said, ‘Yeah, yeah, Hitler’s generals.’ I explained to him that Rommel had to commit suicide after taking part in a plot against Hitler.”

But Trump did not know who Rommel was, either.

During the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, Trump complained several times that the U.S. military wasn’t as draconian as the Chinese. “The Chinese Generals would know what to do,” he said in private conversations, referring to the Tiananmen Square massacre, sources told The Atlantic.

Meanwhile, Trump has spent months expressing outward disdain for Americans who actually served in the military. In August, the former president drew the ire of the Army after he was caught red-handed filming video in Section 60 of Arlington National Cemetery, where recent military casualties are buried. Trump’s campaign staffers reportedly launched into a verbal and physical fight with cemetery officials, who had asked the campaign to stop videotaping. Federal law prohibits politically related activities in the cemetery, including taking photos and videos in support of a political campaign.

Earlier that month, the reputed Vietnam-era draft dodger came under additional fire for arguing that the Presidential Medal of Freedom he awarded to one of his billionaire donors was “much better” than the nation’s highest military honor, the Medal of Honor. That comment rubbed veterans the wrong way, who connected Trump’s disrespectful rhetoric to a 2020 Atlantic report that caught the former president repeatedly referring to fallen soldiers as “suckers and losers.”

And Trump’s attempts to cover his flailing image have been thoroughly undercut by his own actions. After offering in front of TV cameras to help personally pay for the funeral of Vanessa Guillén, a 20-year-old Army private who was beaten to death by a fellow soldier at Fort Hood, Trump reportedly complained to his then–Chief of Staff Mark Meadows about the cost of the burial.

“It doesn’t cost 60,000 bucks to bury a fucking Mexican,” Trump reportedly said, ordering Meadows not to pay it. Natalie Khawam, the Guillén family’s attorney, confirmed to The Atlantic that she had sent the funeral receipt to the White House following Trump’s offer but that the family had never received funds from him.

After Senator John McCain died in 2018, Trump reportedly told aides that they were “not going to support that loser’s funeral” and was irate that the White House had lowered its flags to half-mast in honor of the war hero. “What the fuck are we doing that for? Guy was a fucking loser,” he said, according to The Atlantic.

Donald Trump’s cronies are already making plans to overturn North Carolina’s election results if a majority of the state’s voters choose Kamala Harris for president.

Ivan Raiklin, a supporter of the former president who calls himself Trump’s future “secretary of retribution,” has prepared a plan to deliver North Carolina’s 16 electoral votes to Trump, regardless of how the votes go. Raiklin, an attorney and military veteran, has close ties to people in Trump’s inner circle, including Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser who was pardoned by the former president. 

Raiklin told his plan to an audience at the Christian nationalist ReAwaken America Tour over the weekend in Selma, North Carolina, after being introduced by Flynn, according to Rolling Stone. Raiklin claimed that Hurricane Helene’s devastation may hurt Republican turnout in the state and give Democrats the edge on November 5, so he asked the crowd to pressure the state’s Republican leadership to ignore a favorable Democratic result.

Specifically, the leaders he mentioned were North Carolina state House Speaker Tim Moore and embattled Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson, who presides over the state Senate. Raiklin’s plan involves the state legislature reacting quickly in January 2025 before the election results are certified by Congress, but only if Trump loses.

“If it’s legit, we don’t have to worry, right?” Raiklin told the partisan audience. “But who thinks it’s going to be legit? You think they’re just going to give it to you? No, there’s going to be a fight!”

Raiklin told the crowd to “apply the necessary motivation” to the state’s Republicans, who control both houses of the legislature, by telling the senators and representatives that “they have the political obligation to remedy an illegitimate election.”

In Raiklin’s mind, this process, which he said is “the only way … we can address” the “calamity in western North Carolina” in a “legal, moral, ethical manner under our Constitution,” would be livestreamed on Rumble and Elon Musk’s X, adding that he hoped the “radical left media” would “start to cry.”

Raiklin’s plan is far-fetched, but not far off from the many fake-elector schemes attempted after Trump lost the 2020 presidential election. While each one of those was thwarted, Raiklin’s cryptic language could incite MAGA-aligned protesters to attempt to force the state’s legislature to overturn a possible Democratic victory, which could turn into a mini-January 6. It all depends on whether Raiklin’s half-baked plan garners any support, or if he’s exposed as a blustering troll.

A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the Army to release all of its records related to Donald Trump’s controversial visit to Arlington National Cemetery in August.

American Oversight, a nonprofit organization dedicated to government transparency, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia asking for the records to be made public under the Freedom of Information Act.

Senior Judge Paul Friedman granted the group’s request, which asked for “any report—including, but not limited to, an incident report filed with U.S. Army Military Police Corps officials and/or any other military officials at Arlington National Cemetery—regarding the alleged incident reported to have taken place during the August 26, 2024, visit by former President Trump to Arlington National Cemetery.”

On August 26, Trump visited the cemetery to attend a wreath-laying ceremony for 13 U.S. service members who were killed in an attack at Kabul’s airport during the U.S. evacuation of Afghanistan three years before. After the event concluded, Trump campaign staff recorded the former president smiling and giving a thumbs-up sign next to military graves, footage of which was later used in campaign ads.

When a cemetery employee tried to stop the campaign from taking photos or video, as such political activity is illegal, they were physically shoved by a Trump staffer. The employee opted not to press charges against the staffer, and wished to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation from Trump’s supporters. Trump, meanwhile, denied any wrongdoing. His campaign said it would release footage that would show that no laws were broken, but to date has not.

The judge gave the Army an October 25 deadline to release the requested records. Such material could prove damaging and embarrassing to the former president, possibly showing how the physical altercation was instigated and how Trump reacted to it. With the election only weeks away and Trump already having a poor reputation with military veterans, the former president is probably hoping no one pays attention when the truth finally comes out.

A federal judge has declared that Rudy Giuliani must hand over his most valuable possessions in just seven days to the Georgia election workers he defamed.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman ordered Giuliani to relinquish his possessions, including his Manhattan penthouse, to the mother-daughter duo Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. Since winning their defamation lawsuit against the former New York mayor and Donald Trump attorney last year, the pair have been waiting for Giuliani to pay up the $148 million judgment.

Giuliani was convicted last year of defaming Freeman and Moss, and inflicting emotional and reputational harm, in spreading lies that they tampered with ballots while working the polls in 2020.

After Giuliani failed to declare bankruptcy and still evaded accountability, the judge’s order Tuesday means that the election workers will finally have justice (and all of Giuliani’s prized assets) in just a week’s time. Some of that stuff may include: around two dozen watches (including a commemorative 9/11 watch), a signed Joe DiMaggio jersey, and a 1980 Mercedes.

This comes as just another blow for Giuliani, who formally lost his license to practice law in September.

“Last December, a jury delivered a powerful verdict in their favor, and we’re proud that today’s ruling makes that verdict a reality,” said Aaron Nathan, a lawyer representing Freeman and Moss. “This outcome should send a powerful message that there is a price to pay for those who choose to intentionally spread disinformation.”

The mother-daughter duo will also be entitled to an estimated $2 million in legal fees that Giuliani says Trump still owes him. One of Giuliani’s biggest assets is still up in the air: his Palm Beach, Florida,  condominium. 

While the judge has scheduled a hearing for Monday about Giuliani’s condo, it’s unclear how the former Trump lawyer will shake down the Republican nominee for the legal fees he’s owed.

This story has been updated.

After backing out of several major interviews at the last minute, Donald Trump has one last major appearance on the horizon: The Joe Rogan Experience.

The Republican presidential nominee will be meeting with the former Fear Factor host on Friday, reported Politico. It’ll be the first time that Trump has appeared on Rogan’s podcast.

Over the last several months, Trump has made a concerted effort to reach young, male voters by signing up for a slew of interviews with podcasters, including Twitch ban-ee Adin Ross; the Lex Fridman Podcast; Six Feet Under, hosted by wrestler Mark Calaway (perhaps better known as The Undertaker); and Theo Von’s podcast, This Past Weekend.

Meanwhile, Trump has aggressively dodged more mainstream news appearances, including going so far as to break election tradition by refusing to sit for a 60 Minutes interview in September, which he reportedly backed out of last-minute over fears that the rigorous show would fact-check him.

Rogan shared an odd moment with Trump in August, when the podcasting behemoth appeared to side with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over the MAGA leader before the independent presidential candidate bent the knee to Trump. Trump then chose to clap back, writing on Truth Social that he was looking forward to Rogan getting “booed” at a UFC tournament.

Following the first presidential debate between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris last month, Rogan gave the Democratic presidential nominee her flowers, commenting on air that whoever helped coach her had done a “fucking amazing job.”

“See, the difference in that debate was not a difference in, like, who’s gonna have better policies? Who’s gonna be better for the country?” Rogan told comedian Tom Segura at the time. “The … debate, in my opinion, was who was better prepared. She was way better prepared.”

Harris has also been in talks to sit down with Rogan for an interview, reported Reuters.