Ex-Defense Secretary: Trump admin acting more like dictatorship than a democracy
Former Defense Secretary William Cohen on Tuesday slammed Donald Trump’s administration for acting like a “dictatorship” as the president continues to accept defeat in the 2020 election.
“We’re witnessing the decimation of the democratic institutions which the American people have come to expect will be non-political in terms of our national security,” Cohen told CNN’s Don Lemon.
Lemon asked Cohen, a GOP former senator for Maine who led the Pentagon during Bill Clinton’s time in office, to comment on Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s “refusing to acknowledge” the victory of Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
Pompeo told reporters Tuesday that, “There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration.” Trump, who has refused to concede the election and has promoted baseless conspiracy theories about mass voter fraud, later praised Pompeo on Twitter:
That’s why Mike was number one in his class at West Point! https://t.co/hldYAphqmM
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 11, 2020
Cohen told Lemon:
“My reaction is the way they are conducting themselves is more akin to a dictatorship than a democracy.”
“And I think the State Department has been politicized just like the DOD has tried to be politicized, and what we’ve done to undermine the intelligence community and other agencies,” he added. “I think it’s consistent with what has been taking place for four years now.”
Check out the interview here:
"We're witnessing the decimation of the democratic institutions which the American people have come to expect will be non-political in terms of our national security," says former US Defense Secretary William Cohen about Pres. Trump's ousting of Pentagon officials pic.twitter.com/Px327ezdZb
— CNN Tonight (@CNNTonight) November 11, 2020
This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
