Source: Politics<\/p>\n
Former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, making the media rounds before his book release, said in interview excerpts released on Thursday that he was \u201cflabbergasted\u201d by a Trump official\u2019s proposal in spring 2020 to send as many as 250,000 troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.<\/p>\n
In the \u201c60 Minutes\u201d interview, Esper recounted an exchange with Stephen Miller, a senior adviser to then-President Donald Trump and the architect behind the president\u2019s immigration agenda. Miller had suggested the U.S. send a quarter-million troops \u2014 what would have been the largest use of the military inside the country since the Civil War \u2014 to handle \u201ccaravans\u201d at the southern border, Esper said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he\u2019s joking,\u201d the former Defense secretary said in the interview<\/a> with CBS\u2019 Norah O\u2019Donnell set to air on Sunday. \u201cAnd then I turn around, and I look at him in these deadpan eyes. It\u2019s clear that he is not joking. And so I say something like, \u2018Well, look, DHS can handle whatever caravans are coming up. They\u2019ve done so in the past.\u2019 He said \u2014 he repeats \u2014 \u2018No, we need a quarter-million troops,\u2019 and I just turned squarely around him, face him and say, \u2018I don\u2019t have a quarter-million troops to send on some ridiculous mission to the border.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Esper\u2019s upcoming book, \u201cA Sacred Oath,\u201d is set to publish Tuesday and will add to the growing volume of material that reveals the inner workings of the Trump administration. The book will offer Esper\u2019s \u201ccandid perspective\u201d and shed light on unknown stories from the Trump presidency, according to The New York Times,<\/a> which reported some of the upcoming memoir\u2019s contents on Thursday.<\/p>\n Esper\u2019s book in particular has been widely anticipated, given the abrupt end to his role as Pentagon chief. Trump terminated him in November 2020, right after his election defeat, sparking concerns about the stability of national security.<\/p>\n His new memoir will paint a picture of an unpredictable Trump, according to the Times, and what Esper says was a noticeable shift in the president\u2019s disposition after his first impeachment trial. Esper will also name officials he saw as dangerous influences on the former president, including Miller.<\/p>\n In the CBS interview, Esper said he checked on Miller\u2019s proposal with Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Mark Milley to make sure the plan wasn\u2019t progressing. He said Milley, after doing some digging, returned with a paper in hand \u2014 showing that officials had indeed developed the \u201cinitial concept of how this might happen.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI was just flabbergasted, that not only was the idea proposed, but that people, people in my department, were working on it,\u201d Esper said.<\/p>\n He went on to call the idea \u201cabsurd,\u201d and said he ordered Milley to shut it down and direct further questions to Esper.<\/p>\n \u201cIt died,\u201d Esper said. \u201cAs it should.\u201d<\/p>\n A spokesperson for Trump did not immediately respond on Thursday to a request for comment about Esper\u2019s account.<\/p>\n