Free Republic

President Trump’s words and actions Monday – railing against “weak” governors and mayors, then holding a Bible outside a historic church near the White House – may have marked “the beginning of the end” of American democracy, a retired four-star Marine Corps general writes in an op-ed article. “The slide of the United States into illiberalism may well have begun on June 1, 2020,” John Allen, who served as a special envoy for the global alliance against ISIS under former President Barack Obama and now heads the Brookings Institution think tank, writes in Foreign Policy magazine. “Remember the date. It...

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley didn’t tell then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo or White House national security adviser Robert O’Brien about his calls with China’s military during the final months of President Donald Trump’s administration, according to a report. Pompeo and O’Brien also were unaware of any intelligence that China might suspect a Trump-ordered US attack, as was reportedly the reason for unusual assurances... ..Mark Esper, secretary of defense at the time of the October call, reportedly was aware of the pre-election outreach to China. But Christopher Miller, the acting defense secretary at the time of...