Former Trump aide blames Republicans 'who know better' for continuing to prop up Trump
The co-hosts of "The View" recalled a kind of "greatest hits" of things that Donald Trump did over the years that were objectionable – before his former White House aide struck out against her own party, saying that the reason this kind of behavior continues is that the GOP refuses to eradicate it.
Speaking Wednesday, Joy Behar cracked jokes about Trump complaining it would take him a long time to go through all the documents he's accused of storing at his Mar-a-Lago home.
"It's like the Marie Kondo defense. I'm going to clean up my bathroom, and it's taking me forever to move these nuclear secrets around the house," Behar said. "It's just exhausting. Plus the fact that you don't have a right to take the documents. They belong to the United States of America. They don't belong to you."
The co-hosts discussed some of Trump's most unpatriotic comments or behavior. Behar recalled the stories of Trump with Gen. John Kelly, who was serving as Trump's chief of staff at the time. The group stood at the grave of Kelly's son, who was killed in action in Afghanistan in 2010.
"I don't get it. What was in it for them?" Trump asked. Kelly remarked that Trump genuinely didn't grasp the concept of patriotism and service. His presidency continued with a common belief that service to America was about him and synonymous with service to him personally. That sentiment was evident in the statement his civil attorney Alina Habba made outside the Miami courthouse Tuesday in which she claimed that the indictment of Trump came from people who "do not love America" and "hate Donald Trump."
This kind of behavior persists not because of Trump, but because of those who continue to promote him, explained Alyssa Farah Griffin, a former Trump staffer.
"We have to remember when we talk about support for Trump, it doesn't happen in a vacuum. It's people around him who continue to prop him up. It's a lot of elected Republicans who know better," she said.
"I know these people. I talk to them one-on-one. They see him similarly to how I see him. I [also] want to note there's this effort to undermine the justice department. In the last week alone, the Department of Justice convicted a man who was conspiring with ISIS. They broke up two sex trafficking rings and convicted a pharmacist who had a $1 million opioid conspiracy. They do good work. Law enforcement, Republicans, we're supposed to be on the side of law enforcement, not trying to deconstruct the Department of Justice."
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