Trump Kicks Defense Sec Mattis To The Curb Two Months Early

Donald Trump kicks Mattis to the curb early

We've heard reports for days now that Donald Trump is super-mad that outgoing Secretary of Defense James Mattis (who resigned this week because Trump unilaterally decided to pull all troops out of Syria) called out the president’s "rejection of international allies and his failure to check authoritarian governments," as the New York Times writes, in his resignation letter.

The goodbye letter led to mucho bad press for the Trumpster.

So much so that now he's decided Mattis will now be gone as of January 1.

I am pleased to announce that our very talented Deputy Secretary of Defense, Patrick Shanahan, will assume the title of Acting Secretary of Defense starting January 1, 2019. Patrick has a long list of accomplishments while serving as Deputy, & previously Boeing. He will be great!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2018

Mattis had said he would serve until the end of February so as to allow an orderly transition of power.

Guess not. https://t.co/N56vTVdkAc

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) December 23, 2018

An acting SecDef, an acting AG, and an acting WH COS all during a government shutdown. #chaoschristmas

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) December 23, 2018

Also, who knows what Mattis will say publicly once he’s no longer running DOD. His letter makes clear he’s alarmed. Why would he stay quiet? https://t.co/OXltI9Fd6h

— Josh Barro (@jbarro) December 23, 2018

Defense Secretary Mattis Was "Appalled" By Trump's Transgender Ban Tweets

In announcing his ban on transgender service members in the U.S. military, Donald Trump made a point to say the decision was made "after consultation with my Generals and military experts," but apparently Trump blind-sided just about every on his military team.

And what he didn't make abundantly clear was the ban was actually was a snap maneuver to save money for his Mexican wall.

You know, the wall Mexico was going to pay for?

From the New York Times:

Mr. Trump made the declaration on Twitter, saying that American forces could not afford the “tremendous medical costs and disruption” of transgender service members. He said he had consulted generals and military experts, but Jim Mattis, the defense secretary, was given only a day’s notice about the decision.

Mr. Trump elected to announce the ban in order to resolve a quietly brewing fight on Capitol Hill over whether taxpayer money should pay for gender transition and hormone therapy for transgender service members. The dispute had threatened to kill a $790 billion defense and security spending package scheduled for a vote this week.

But rather than addressing that narrow issue, Mr. Trump opted to upend the entire policy on transgender service members.

His decision was announced with such haste that the White House could not answer basic inquiries about how it would be carried out, including what would happen to openly transgender people on active duty. Of eight defense officials interviewed, none could say.

Mr. Mattis, who was on vacation, was silent on the new policy. People close to the defense secretary said he was appalled that Mr. Trump chose to unveil his decision in tweets, in part because of the message they sent to transgender active-duty service members, including those deployed overseas, that they were suddenly no longer welcome.

Repeat: "The defense secretary said he was appalled..."