Earlier today, Trump put out a statement regarding news released within Bob Woodward’s new book. Woodward wrote that Chairman Gen. Milley took the extraordinary (but not unheard of) step of reaching out to the Chinese military leadership in the last weeks of the Trump presidency to assure them that there was no “wag the dog” scenario that the Chinese need to worry about, nor would Milley allow Trump to order nuclear weapon use. Milley certainly implied, while speaking to the Chinese, that the U.S. military would not carry out some crazed order by a crazed man.

Trump put out a statement in response to the revelations this morning that was as crazed as one would expect. In it, Trump said that Milley should be fired immediately and tried for TREASON (Trump’s all caps). Today, during a pentagon hearing, a reporter appropriately asked John Kirby if Milley should be fired and tried for treason. We should not blame the reporter because the question was certainly not asked by someone who necessarily believes it’s a legitimate issue. It is asked in order to get an official response to Trump’s statement.

It certainly took Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby by surprise, leaving him entirely flabbergasted. Kirby likely doesn’t follow Trump’s daily statements:

QUESTION: “The White House basically, former President Trump would actually know about the communication before taking place and know what happened in the conversation. So for him to say if the allegations made in the book by Woodward and Costa were true then the chairman should be put on trial for treason,”

KIRBY: “Oh my goodness!”

REPORTER: “These are not my words.”

KIRBY: “Yeah, look, I can’t speak to processes before this administration took office. I just can’t. As much as I know you’d like me to, I just can’t do that. What I’m telling you is, typically, that when the chairman or the secretary, they interact with counterparts. It’s a function of the job. They have to do that. That these conversations are properly coordinated. That’s the way it goes.”

“Now is every single interaction written down and sent in a memo. Probably not, but ones that are of consequence and they almost all, they are fully coordinated,” he continued. “I can’t speak to processes previous to January 20th of this year. I can just tell you that how we’re approaching the issue in this administration.”

Kirby handled the question extremely well and likely didn’t anticipate the reporter using Trump’s words without noting that he was quoting Trump’s statement. Caught in the moment, he demonstrated why being a spokesperson at this level is such a difficult job.

Pentagon spokesperson Kirby is taken aback when a reporter, channeling Trump, asks about the appropriateness of putting Milley "on trial for treason" pic.twitter.com/zshSYUwlMv

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 15, 2021

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