From those who know him best:
Mark R. Levin
@marklevinshow
THE REAL JOHN KELLY
Here's what a knowledgeable former White House staffer just texted me about John Kelly and his disastrous time as chief of staff:
"The irony of John Kelly claiming Trump was dictatorial is almost too rich to digest. He personified a Napoleon complex in all its excesses! He daily had to approve guests to the Navy mess, approved or denied requests of staff to use White House exercise facility, insisted on signing off on all newspaper and magazine subscriptions, and demanded a daily summary of all websites visited by sr personnel. He was an out of control, obsessive control freak --- terribly insecure, past the point of paranoia, and after quickly spending his political capital with the boss -- went on incessant jihads to terminate all those he thought too close to POTUS that he could get away with. He refused to share phone logs with POTUS if they contained names he didn't want him speaking to -- it was ENDLESS. And there was the time he physically pushed past Ivanka, which was witnessed by several people. Ask ANYONE, Mark!"
Trump's four-star bully chief of staff John Kelly was a traitor within
Peter Navarro
October 25, 2024
Kelly's sensational claims about the president highlight his incompetence, mismanagement, and contempt for the chain of command.
No one knows former Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly better than I do. This bitter, bullying coward should be cast into the dustbin of history for once again smearing Donald Trump, just days before the most important election in modern American history.
It may seem reasonable to assume a four-star general would make a good chief of staff, but that assumption is deeply flawed.
Kelly invariably hated those closest to Trump. As chief of staff, he single-handedly turned Trump allies into bitter and viperous enemies.
Four-star generals like Kelly typically reach the top of their profession because they are seen as the sharpest tools in the military shed. Yet in the West Wing, among uber-elite civilians from academia, the corporate world, and Wall Street, Kelly was consistently the dumbest guy in the room.
Regarding Kelly's leadership, I had to brace myself physically every time his office called, as it inevitably involved some form of threat or abuse. Some leaders inspire, while others attempt to "lead" through intimidation. Kelly was clearly the latter, and I can't imagine serving under his command in combat.
But Kelly's flawed leadership wasn't the most concerning issue. His real failure was his refusal to obey the president, breaking the chain of command.
Kelly, along with Defense Secretary James "Mad Dog" Mattis, knew better than anyone that the military's survival depends on strict respect for the chain of command. Yet once Kelly and Mattis reached the pinnacle of civilian power, they acted as if no one, not even the president, was above them.
Kelly routinely subverted the president's trade agenda. When my former boss instructed Kelly to prepare an executive order to impose steel and aluminum tariffs or tariffs on China, Kelly would consistently delay the process by subjecting it to an extended review.
Kelly employed the same tactic whenever the president attempted to push trading partners like South Korea and Japan to stop screwing us in trade. Both Kelly and Mattis resisted actions that could threaten military alliances with these countries, ignoring the fact that gutting our economy and manufacturing base would ultimately weaken our ability to defend ourselves, let alone any other nation.
Why was Kelly so opposed to Trump's trade policies? Lacking any economic training, Kelly fell easily into the globalist mindset of West Wing figures like National Economic Council Directors Gary Cohn and Larry Kudlow and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin -- all of whom worked to block the president's trade policies.
Because Kelly had no training in politics, he failed to understand the importance of trade policy in holding the high political ground of blue wall manufacturing states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan that Trump had won in 2016.
Because Kelly didn't know how to "let Trump be Trump," as Corey Lewandowski famously advised, there was no way "Captain Queeg" Kelly would allow anyone with differing trade policy ideas near the Oval Office.
Kelly regularly eavesdropped on press phone calls and scrutinized overnight phone logs. If someone like me called the president, we were threatened with firing.
...
Now, it saddens and infuriates me to see Kelly play the court jester to the Atlantic, of all places. I had hoped that the Biden-Harris administration's tragic mishandling of the Afghanistan withdrawal, where Kelly's own son died in combat, might have brought him out of his hate-filled and vengeful derangement. I was wrong. And the
Mark Paoletta
@MarkPaoletta
I worked in the White House with John Kelly, and I don't believe a word he says. He was a terrible chief of staff who dishonestly kept information from the President to pursue his own agenda, an unelected former military official substituting his judgment for the duly elected President. Here are two examples:
1) In 2018, President Trump asked OMB Director Mulvaney to find money in agency accounts to build the wall to secure our southern border. Mulvaney asked OMB Deputy Russ Vought and me as OMB GC to do a deep dive on this project, and with the help of superb career staff, we found a ton of money at the DOD that we could use to build the wall.
But Kelly prevented Mulvaney from presenting this plan to President Trump. Several months later, in a meeting, Trump said "Mick, I asked you to find me money and you haven't." Mulvaney responded "I found the money but I have not been able to brief you." Kelly would not set up policy time for Mulvaney to discuss the plan with Trump.
After this exchange, Mulvaney presented the plan and the President authorized this strategy. John Kelly was insubordinate and duplicitous by refusing to provide the President with lawful options to implement the President's policies.
2) Because of the manner in which the Election Integrity Commission was set up, I wanted to have the President shut it down and direct the DOJ to investigate election fraud. At the time, I was the Counsel to VP Pence, who was the co-chair of the commission, and I had developed a list of previous presidential directives to DOJ to investigate a specific matter so that when making this recommendation I could show it was well supported by history and tradition.
In a meeting with Kelly and others, I made this recommendation and shared the list of examples of Presidents directing DOJ to engage on specific matters. Kelly said he would never show this list to the President because it would be terrible if President Trump knew he could do this, his life was tough enough in dealing with the President, and he did not want him to know this. To my knowledge, President Trump was never made aware of these examples.
John Kelly thought he knew better than President Trump and was opposed to many of his policies. As Chief of Staff, Kelly dishonestly tried to thwart President Trump's policies, and on the wall funding he was totally fine with not doing everything possible to stop illegal aliens flooding into our country and murdering innocent Americans, all in order to protect the bloated bureaucracy of his DOD.
John Kelly will say anything to stop President Trump from being re-elected. It won't work.
Vote Trump Vance 2024.
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
Thank you for your support against a total degenerate named John Kelly, who made up a story out of pure Trump Derangement Syndrome Hatred! This guy had two qualities, which don't work well together. He was tough and dumb. The problem is his toughness morphed into weakness, because he became JELLO with time! The story about the Soldiers was A LIE, as are numerous other stories he told. Even though I shouldn't be wasting my time with him, I always feel it's necessary to hit back in pursuit of THE TRUTH. John Kelly is a LOWLIFE, and a bad General, whose advice in the White House I no longer sought, and told him to MOVE ON! His wife once told me, at Camp David, John admires you tremendously, and when he leaves the Military, he will only speak well of you. I said, Thank you!
Bonus:
The CNN debacle was the "last straw" for many Democrats: