Former President Donald Trump, now Republicans’ presumptive presidential nominee for the elections this year, is facing extensive criticism for asserting in a new interview with Fox News that he would “fire” military leaders characterized as “woke.”
“Woke” is used by the Right as shorthand for a raft of workplace and personnel policies they dislike, among other targets. That list includes diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI); critical race theory; and more.
Asked in the Fox interview if he would fire the “woke generals at the top,” Trump replied in the affirmative. “Yes,” he said. “I would get rid of them, yeah. But see, now I know ’em. I didn’t know ’em before. I came in — what do I know? I was a New York real estate person. But no, I’d fire ’em. I would fire them. You can’t have woke military.”
Certain efforts at inclusion touched upon by the DEI concept have been a central target for Republicans peddling outrage like what Trump was rehashing, as have alleged intersections between the military and, specifically, drag performers.
“We cannot underestimate how dangerous this would be,” replied Marine Corps veteran and former Kentucky Senate candidate Amy McGrath. And this “should scare America,” added former Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill.
On the flip side, pro-Trump activist Ryan Fournier, a chairman at Students for Trump, was vociferously supportive in the comments section of an original post highlighting the remarks from a rapid response team that is part of the Biden re-election campaign. “There’s too many Generals to begin with. Most of which sit at the Pentagon and make memos on how the military should be more woke,” he wrote. Far-right complaints of “woke” policies seem to often come with apparently no specific explanation of what they’re talking about.
Trump, meanwhile, already has a history of trying to exert tight control over personnel processes, having spurred a startling rate of turnover in high-ranking government positions when he was president the first time.
