Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin doubled down on her previous reporting which claimed President Donald Trump disrespected veterans and war dead, adding that Secretary of Treasury Steve Mnuchin was in the room with the president when he disparaged four-star generals.
Griffin reported Mnuchin was at the Tank meeting in the Pentagon on July 20, 2017, when Trump allegedly called four-star generals “losers,” “dopes,” and “babies”– calling his claim to have never heard the president speak that way “patently false.”
“I confirmed with people who were present at the meeting that the president used those exact words in a meeting at the Pentagon,” she said. “I also circled back with my sources this weekend that confirmed that the president did not go, or did not want to go to the Aisne-Marne cemetery in France to honor the American war dead when he could no longer fly by helicopter and that one of the president’s favorite words that he uses when he’s angry is ‘loser.'”
She noted that her sources include two former senior Trump administration officials who were on the trip to France with the president — adding that although they didn’t hear him make those comments at the cemetery, they have heard him say that anyone who fought in the Vietnam War was a “sucker.”
“According to this source, the president would often say about American veterans: ‘What’s in it for them? They don’t make any money,'” Griffin went on. “The source said it was a character flaw of the president, he could not understand why someone would die for their country — not worth it to him.”
Griffin claimed that the source also said Trump did not want veterans involved in the July Fourth parade, adding that he did not want “wounded guys” there because “it’s not a good look.” The president does, however, like to use the military as a prop, according to Griffin’s sources, and views his relationship with the Pentagon as transactional.
