Frank Kendall
Appearances
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
It is. I've never seen it done before quite this way. without any interruption. As far as I know, there was no reason not to do that in this case.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
Sure. First of all, General Brown is one of the, if not the finest officer I've ever worked with. One of the things that stands out about the military services in the United States is the apolitical nature of all of our officer corps.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
And I've been through a lot of transitions and I have seen in every case, very smooth professional transitions where people, you know, they adapt to the policies of the new team in charge. They follow orders as they should and they give good advice.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
I don't really understand the connection, quite frankly. I also don't understand the obsessiveness about wokeness, whatever that is. You know, it's perfectly within the purview of a new secretary and president to change policies, and that's perfectly fine. And I think all the officers who serve would carry out those orders. It would be a lawful order. It would be no problem.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
There isn't much there to actually remove. There's a few hours of training a year. And again, I don't know what they mean by wokeness. I'm not sure what they mean by that at all. The impact of what they've done is to politicize these positions to a degree that I've never seen before. These officers serve apolitically. They are loyal to whoever is in power. They carry out their policies.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
And what's been created by doing this is an environment in which career officers suddenly have to worry about their political alignment.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
No, absolutely not. We did pay attention to disparities in the Department of the Air Force. We had some studies that were done under the previous Trump administration that showed significant disparities. But we never lowered any of our standards about moving people into positions or promoting them or anything else that was competitively selected.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
I do. I have no reason to say that he's not qualified, except for the fact that he does not have the experience that is normally associated with that job. Normally, and by law, a person who goes into the chairman's job...
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
chairman of the Joint Chiefs, should have served as a four-star general in another major command, either as a head of one of the military services or as a head of one of the major component commands around the world. General Kane has not done that.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
I find that more troubling in a way than removing the other individuals that have been removed.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
He seems to want to have JAG officers who will say yes to whatever operational people want to do. Judge Advocate Generals, which are the lawyers in uniform, basically.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
They're the people who administer the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the criminal law that applies to people serving, and also interpret things like the laws of armed conflict or the laws that would restrict the use of the military against American civilians. So they have a very important role to play. They're professionals. They're not political appointees at all.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
So to just reach down within the structure and remove the legal authorities that would constrain the behavior of the military, ensure that the military follows lawful orders, is very troubling to me.
Consider This from NPR
Are Trump's military picks based on merit or loyalty?
Thank you, Mary Louise. Good to be with you.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
Thank you, Rachel. Great to be with you.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
It is a big deal. And I chose my words carefully and very thoughtfully. I felt that in the announcements about the people being replaced, that the removal of the judge advocate generals, the head lawyers for each of the services, was not getting the attention that it deserved. And I really wanted to call some attention to that because of the implications that could possibly have.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
First of all, I have a lot of confidence in our Judge Advocate General. This is a class of very professional people. I've worked with them over most of my career in a number of different capacities, and I've seen what they can do. What I'm concerned about, though, here is that there'll be some effort to find people who are going to be very compliant with whatever the administration wants to do.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
Secretary Hegseth has made some public comments about this. He's talked about JAGs constraining operators excessively when they're engaged in combat. That's a concern that lower-ranking people might have about not being allowed to use as much firepower as they'd like, for example.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
But the rules of engagement, the rules of armed conflict, and so on, are there for a reason, and they have to be followed by people. And we use the JAGs to help enforce that. That's one aspect of it. But there are a number of other things that the Jags would be able to pronounce judgments on and, again, have legal authority over people in uniform.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
And that includes, as you mentioned, use of the military within the United States against American citizens. There are legal constraints on how the military can be used. But as with all laws, they're subject to interpretation. So I'm concerned about the direction in which this is heading. This wasn't part of the DEI, you know, war against DEI that's being waged.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
The JAGs really have no role in that. These are not people who have, you know, other than fairly narrow responsibilities, well down within the structure of each of the services. So, it really struck me as unusual and hard to understand why these particular people would be single out for replacement.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
First of all, we're seeing a number of behaviors, and not just these of the military and so on, but we're seeing the use of a non-government employee, a billionaire to command, and pretty much wreak havoc with the entire federal government apparatus. We're seeing declarations of things like birthright citizenship no longer being valid under the Constitution. So there's a large range of things.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
Not following the law and relieving the inspector generals that were relieved. I think your previous guest mentioned that there are 75 lawsuits going on right now. President Trump made the comment recently that, you know, if you're saving the nation, you're above the law. Words to that effect. These are dangerous things to hear from an American president. And the conduct has been very consistent.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
So I think rogue is a reasonable description. I think it's an apt description. And I think it should make us all concerned as citizens. You know, whatever our views on various issues, we all should believe in the rule of law. It's the most fundamental American principle. It distinguished us from, you know, almost any totalitarian state, certainly.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
And so we should all be united in saying that, wait a minute, whatever our differences may be, if we're going to—we can pursue those, we can debate, we can have processes play out to try to resolve those differences, but we have to do that within the law.
The Rachel Maddow Show
Democrats not immune from voter wrath as pressure to impede Trump mounts
That is so fundamental to the existence of our democracy and to our freedom as citizens that I think every American should recognize that that's a concern.