Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus, whom Donald Trump has tapped as his top White House operatives, will faithfully push the agenda that helped the billionaire real-estate tycoon win the presidency, Carl Higbie, a retired U.S. Navy SEAL, told Newsmax TV.
"A guy like Steve Bannon is well-versed; he's a very high-profile political operative," Higbie, now spokesman for the pro-Trump Great America PAC, said Monday to Bill Tucker on "America Talks Live."
"This guy is really intelligent, but he's also pushing the very agenda that Trump got elected on. So you need that strong background. But he's also the guy who can say, 'Hey, Donald Trump, you're wrong,' so he needs that."
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Higbie said of Priebus, the Republican National Committee chair who Trump has chosen to be his chief of staff, "is your establishment guy. He's the guy who knows the ins and outs, can work with people.
"The chief of staff, he's the one who's really going to be getting things in and out of the White House. Anything that goes in or out of the Oval Office has got to go through Reince . . ."
"Donald Trump believes that he has now been elected to be the people's highest servant. He doesn't believe that 'Oh, I'm the man now,' like the current administration."
Higbie, author of "Enemies, Foreign & Domestic: A SEAL's Story," written with Brandon Caro and published by Post Hill Press, told Tucker he believes Trump cares more about the nation's future than his own businesses.
"Look, this guy is a billionaire. He could've lived his life on a beach, but he chose to throw himself in the public spotlight for 16 months and just get beat up by every single person," Higbie said.
"And then still beat them and now he's here and he's like: 'I don't care about my multi-billionaire dollar business. I care about America.'"
"This is the first guy ever, though, that has a decrease in lifestyle because of moving into the White House."
Higbie also said Trump will not leave those benefiting from parts of the Affordable Care Act high and dry while he makes improvements to national health coverage.
"You can't just day one say 'done' and dump 15 million people off of a health insurance plan that previously had gotten lost," he said. "Obamacare was deigned to not be unimplemented by design, because they didn't want someone to come in and repeal it. And so they've made it exponentially more difficult.
"Now it's going to hurt the American people if you just cut it right now, so Donald Trump is finding a way. Believe me, it will be repealed; it will be replaced. But it's going to be done at a way that's humane so people can get on other plans. We broke it, we bought it, so there's going to be parts that have to be subsidized."
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