“What emerged in two interviews with Trump, and conversations with more than a dozen of his closest advisers and confidants, were the outlines of an imperial presidency that would reshape America and its role in the world,” Cortellessa wrote in his article, adding:
Cortellessa goes on to explain that Trump would weaponize the American justice system in an unprecedented way by being “willing to fire a U.S. Attorney who doesn’t carry out his order to prosecute someone, breaking with a tradition of independent law enforcement that dates from America’s founding.”
“He is weighing pardons for every one of his supporters accused of attacking the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, more than 800 of whom have pleaded guilty or been convicted by a jury. He might not come to the aid of an attacked ally in Europe or Asia if he felt that country wasn’t paying enough for its own defense. He would gut the U.S. civil service, deploy the National Guard to American cities as he sees fit, close the White House pandemic-preparedness office, and staff his Administration with acolytes who back his false assertion that the 2020 election was stolen,” added Cortellessa in his devastating assessment.
Time has also printed the raw transcript of Cortellessa’s interview with Trump that includes asking the former president about his willingness to use the U.S. military domestically:
Cortellessa: You would use the military inland as well as at the border?
Trump: I don’t think I’d have to do that. I think the National Guard would be able to do that. If they weren’t able to, then I’d use the military. You know, we have a different situation. We have millions of people now that we didn’t have two years ago.
Cortellessa: Sir, the Posse Comitatus Act says that you can’t deploy the U.S. military against civilians. Would you override that?
Trump: Well, these aren’t civilians. These are people that aren’t legally in our country. This is an invasion of our country. An invasion like probably no country has ever seen before. They’re coming in by the millions. I believe we have 15 million now. And I think you’ll have 20 million by the time this ends. And that’s bigger than almost every state.
Cortellessa: So you can see yourself using the military to address this?
Trump: I can see myself using the National Guard and, if necessary, I’d have to go a step further. We have to do whatever we have to do to stop the problem we have. Again, we have a major force that’s forming in our country, when you see that over the last three weeks, 29,000 people came in from China, and they’re all fighting age, and they’re mostly males. Yeah, you have to do what you have to do to stop crime and to stop what’s taking place at the border.
