NBA Coach/Air Force Veteran Gregg Popovich: Donald Trump "Is A Soulless Coward"

Coach Gregg Popovich

San Antonio Spurs' five-time NBA championship-winning coach Gregg Popovich, an Air Force veteran, recently called a reporter after hearing the Donald Trump's remarks explaining why he hadn’t mentioned the four US soldiers killed in an ambush in Niger.

For the record, Trump said, “President Obama and other presidents, most of them didn’t make calls, a lot of them didn’t make calls. I like to call when it’s appropriate, when I think I’m able to do it.”

Popovich apparently had had enough. Speaking to Dave Zirin of The Nation, the coach said, “I want to say something, and please just let me talk, and please make sure this is on the record.”

Here is his statement via The Nation:

“I’ve been amazed and disappointed by so much of what this president had said, and his approach to running this country, which seems to be one of just a never-ending divisiveness. But his comments today about those who have lost loved ones in times of war and his lies that previous presidents Obama and Bush never contacted their families are so beyond the pale, I almost don’t have the words.”

According to the reporter, Popovich paused, and then continued.

“This man in the Oval Office is a soulless coward who thinks that he can only become large by belittling others. This has of course been a common practice of his, but to do it in this manner—and to lie about how previous presidents responded to the deaths of soldiers—is as low as it gets. We have a pathological liar in the White House, unfit intellectually, emotionally, and psychologically to hold this office, and the whole world knows it, especially those around him every day. The people who work with this president should be ashamed, because they know better than anyone just how unfit he is, and yet they choose to do nothing about it. This is their shame most of all.”