Treasury Secretary Steven Munchin’s August 19, 2017, four-part defense of President Donald Trump stands in stark contrast to the counterfactual ad hominem attacks on President Trump in the August 18, 2017, “Open Letter” by 350 of Secretary Mnuchin’s Yale classmates urging Secretary Mnuchin “to resign in protest of President Trump’s support of Nazism and white supremacy.”
Of course, President Trump supports neither Nazism nor white supremacy.
The following point-by-point comparison of the “Open Letter” and Secretary Mnuchin’s response hardly needs further commentary. As a former Inspector General and author of “The Inspector General Handbook: Fraud, Waste, Abuse and Other Constitutional ‘Enemies, Foreign and Domestic’,” I would only add that the “Open Letter” includes so many misstatements of facts that someone should conduct a fraud investigation to hold accountable those behind it.
The “Open Letter” purports to be “in response to President Trump’s comments on the recent events in Charlottesville.” Nowhere in their letter do the classmates quote President Trump. Instead, they falsely assert that, “President Trump has declared himself a sympathizer with groups whose values are antithetical to those values we consider fundamental to our sacred honor as Americans, as men and women of Yale, and as decent human beings. President Trump made those declarations loudly, clearly, and unequivocally, and he said them as [Secretary Mnuchin] stood next to him.”
Instead of quoting President Trump’s supposedly unequivocal “declarations,” the Yale classmates simply wrote: “We can be Republican, Democrats, Libertarians, Greens, and a number of other things and still be friends, classmates, and patriots, but we cannot be Nazis and white supremacist,” concluding, “we cannot take the side of what we know to be evil,” followed by a blatantly false reference to, “President Trump’s support of Nazism and white supremacy.”
In contrast, Secretary Mnuchin’s following four-part response to his Yale classmates is factually accurate and quotes President Trump:
"First, I am proud to serve my country as the 77th Treasury Secretary at this critical time in our history, and I do so with a goal of taking actions to improve the economy for the benefit of all of our citizens. I believe that there is a great opportunity to simplify regulations, reform taxes, and generate millions of jobs through higher growth. Additionally, I will use all the powers and resources of the Department of the Treasury's Terrorism and Financial Intelligence units to combat and stop terrorist financing domestically and internationally. These are my most important priorities as Treasury Secretary. I was honored to travel to all parts of the country with the President during his campaign, be chosen by the President to be Treasury Secretary, and will continue to pursue his agenda.
"Second, with regard to the recent, horrible events in Charlcttesvi11e, I strongly condemn the actions of those filled with hate and with the intent to harm others. They have no defense from me nor do they have any defense from the President or this administration. As the President said in his very first comment on the events that were unfolding in Charlottesville, ‘[w]e all must be united and condemn all that hate stands for. There is no place for this kind of violence in America. Let’s come together as one.’
"Third, as someone who is Jewish, I believe I understand the long history of violence and hatred against the Jews (and other minorities) and circumstances that give rise to these sentiments and actions. While I find it hard to believe I should have to defend myself on this, or the President, I feel compelled to let you know that the President in no way, shape or form, believes that neo-Nazi and other hate groups who endorse violence are equivalent to groups that demonstrate in peaceful and lawful ways.
“Finally, as a Yale graduate and a member of what used to be known as Calhoun College (prior to its name change), I am familiar with the culture wars being fought in our country and the impact it is having on many people, with different views of how history should be remembered. Some of these issues are far more complicated than we are led to believe by the mass media, and if it were so simple, such actions would have been taken by other presidents, governors, and mayors, long before President Trump was elected by the American people.”
Secretary Mnuchin concludes his Press Release by shedding light on those behind the blatantly false allegations against President Trump: “Our President deserves the opportunity to propose his agenda and to do so without the attempts by those who opposed him in the primaries, in the general election and beyond to distract the administration and the American people from these most important policy issues – jobs, economic growth, and national security.”
Thank you Secretary Mnuchin for shedding light on your Yale classmates’ fraudulent Charlottesville narrative!
Joseph E. Schmitz served as a foreign policy and national security advisor to Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign. The opinions expressed in this article are his personal opinions. Schmitz served as Inspector General of the Department of Defense from 2002-2005 and is now a Partner in the law firm Schmitz & Socarras LLP. He graduated with distinction from the U.S. Naval Academy, earned his J.D. degree from Stanford Law School, and is author of "The Inspector General Handbook: Fraud, Waste, Abuse, and Other Constitutional ‘Enemies, Foreign and Domestic.’" Read more reports from Joseph E. Schmitz — Click Here Now.
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