WEBVTT - John Kelly 0:00:01.240 --> 0:00:05.160 Retired Marine Corps General John Kelly stepped down as President 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:08.400 Trump's Chief of Staff at the end of eighteen after 0:00:08.480 --> 0:00:11.879 more than a year spent managing the daily operations inside 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:15.040 the West Wing. Kelly spent most of his entire adult 0:00:15.120 --> 0:00:18.079 life serving the nation. He wore a Marine uniform for 0:00:18.120 --> 0:00:21.840 more than forty years. He was briefly retired before joining 0:00:21.840 --> 0:00:25.840 the Trump administration, and June, General Kelly spoke with David Rubinstein, 0:00:25.960 --> 0:00:28.240 co founder of the Carlisle Group and host of the 0:00:28.240 --> 0:00:32.040 Bloomberg television show Peer to Peer Conversations. So let's talk 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:34.640 about first what it was like to be chief of 0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:38.160 staff to President Trump. Was it all that you thought 0:00:38.200 --> 0:00:40.479 it would be in terms of the difficulty, more difficult 0:00:40.479 --> 0:00:43.000 than you thought, or and you pleased you did the job. 0:00:43.400 --> 0:00:46.760 It was certainly amongst the hardest jobs I've had in 0:00:46.840 --> 0:00:48.720 my life. But I would say this as well, after 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:50.680 as much time as I had in the military, it 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:53.320 was the most important thing I ever did. For eighteen months, 0:00:53.520 --> 0:00:55.760 a staff the president the way I think a president 0:00:55.800 --> 0:01:00.760 should be staffed, presenting him options, presenting him the experts, 0:01:00.760 --> 0:01:03.639 and with him to talk and hash things out. That's 0:01:03.680 --> 0:01:07.080 what the chief of staff does. That was vitally important, 0:01:07.280 --> 0:01:09.920 and for eighteen months I was there. I think who 0:01:10.160 --> 0:01:13.080 staff the president very effectively. So was it the hardest 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:17.160 job you've ever had, the most memorable job, the most 0:01:17.240 --> 0:01:21.600 enjoyable job, or just another very interesting job? Now, it 0:01:21.680 --> 0:01:26.720 was very very hard, but very meaningful. Uh, not very enjoyable, 0:01:27.520 --> 0:01:31.200 but you know, I mean it's it was it's staff 0:01:31.200 --> 0:01:33.640 in the president United States. I mean you're trying to 0:01:33.680 --> 0:01:36.520 bring together not only a White House staff, but the 0:01:36.640 --> 0:01:40.520 entire federal government to help him make the kind of decisions, 0:01:40.520 --> 0:01:44.880 whether it's economic decisions, social decisions, or you know, life 0:01:44.880 --> 0:01:48.280 and death wartime decisions. On Washington. It's often said that 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:50.560 people stab you in the back, but also sometimes they 0:01:50.560 --> 0:01:52.800 stab you in the front. And that's the job that 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:55.280 often the cheapest staff is said to have. You get 0:01:55.520 --> 0:01:59.000 criticized by everybody. So did you feel that the criticism 0:01:59.040 --> 0:02:01.720 by people were the hacks on you just for any 0:02:01.760 --> 0:02:04.920 reason something that was unfair or not tolerable? You just 0:02:04.960 --> 0:02:07.520 got used to it, Yeah, I would. I would tell 0:02:07.560 --> 0:02:09.440 you I wasn't used to. One of the things that 0:02:09.520 --> 0:02:12.640 struck me right away that I was not used to 0:02:12.960 --> 0:02:17.359 coming out of the military was the intense personal ambition, um, 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:20.799 that that people have. And because if that gets out 0:02:20.800 --> 0:02:22.600 of hand, which I think it was out of hand 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:25.639 certainly before my time, and it continued a bit while 0:02:25.680 --> 0:02:29.040 I was there. Uh, people start to do things like 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:33.880 leak to the press things that are untrue, half true, 0:02:34.560 --> 0:02:37.000 not just towards people at the top like me, but 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:40.000 their their their colleagues. One of the things I did 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:42.480 very early on at the when I took over the 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:44.919 White House. Who's got all of the staff together, and 0:02:44.960 --> 0:02:46.040 there's a lot of them. So I had to do 0:02:46.120 --> 0:02:50.120 several sessions and just said, you know, nowhere in the 0:02:50.120 --> 0:02:52.440 oath of office that you take to you know, support 0:02:52.480 --> 0:02:54.960 defend the Constitution United States. Nowhere in there does it 0:02:55.040 --> 0:02:58.280 say that you should be talking to the press unless 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:01.000 that's part of your job and authorize. Nowhere does it 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:03.359 say you should be stabbing your colleagues in the back 0:03:03.440 --> 0:03:07.160 so that you look better you serve the nation, um. 0:03:07.160 --> 0:03:09.680 And if if you take the o seriously, you've got 0:03:09.680 --> 0:03:11.480 a job, and I want you to stay. If you 0:03:11.600 --> 0:03:14.320 if you can't do that, find find another place to work. 0:03:14.440 --> 0:03:16.640 When you're in the military and you tell people you 0:03:16.720 --> 0:03:19.320 do X, Y or Z, they jump over there in 0:03:19.400 --> 0:03:21.760 trouble or they're going to be court martial or something. 0:03:22.160 --> 0:03:24.400 When you tell people as cheaper staff that they should 0:03:24.400 --> 0:03:26.400 do X, Y or z and they don't do it, 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:28.440 what can you really do about it? Well, let me 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:30.640 go back to your original stame. In the military. If 0:03:30.639 --> 0:03:33.280 you tell someone to do X, Y or z, um, 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:38.560 we expect people to question orders, to push back. So 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:42.400 I mean, I can't as a commander know everything in 0:03:42.440 --> 0:03:45.960 the White House. U, your right is not. I mean, 0:03:46.000 --> 0:03:47.640 you could fire people, and I had to fire a 0:03:47.640 --> 0:03:51.160 few people, but very very few. They were very disruptive. 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:53.360 But I had good people. The vast majority of the 0:03:53.360 --> 0:03:55.800 people David that worked there of good people. They just 0:03:55.840 --> 0:03:59.440 need some direction. So when Donald Trump was elected, you 0:03:59.520 --> 0:04:02.560 were already retired from the military. I had retired from 0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:05.800 the military. Uh less, well and about eight months at 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:08.520 that point, never wanting to work again. Okay, And did 0:04:08.600 --> 0:04:10.880 you know Donald Trump at any point? But not in 0:04:10.920 --> 0:04:13.160 anyone like that. So did you met you met him 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:16.279 in the transition. I assume I received a phone call 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:21.200 in late November on a Saturday, and uh, they asked 0:04:21.200 --> 0:04:25.040 me if I wouldn't consider coming up to Bedminster to 0:04:25.080 --> 0:04:28.120 meet with the President elect, and uh, talked to him 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:32.640 about going into the administration. My wife after the phone call, 0:04:33.040 --> 0:04:35.000 asked me, you know, what was that all about? And 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:37.520 I explained to her and I said what he thinks? 0:04:37.520 --> 0:04:39.760 She said, well, you know, uh, if when nothing else 0:04:39.839 --> 0:04:41.760 is a family, we were a family of service. So 0:04:41.760 --> 0:04:43.280 why don't you go up and at least talk to them? 0:04:43.279 --> 0:04:46.000 And so I went up the next day to Bedminster, 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:50.120 talked to the President elect. Bryan's previous was there and 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:52.880 a couple of other people. We had a short chit chat. 0:04:52.920 --> 0:04:55.240 But ten days later he asked me to come up 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:57.120 to New York City to Trump Tower. Went up there 0:04:57.160 --> 0:04:59.920 and you offered me the DHS job, And did you say? 0:05:00.000 --> 0:05:02.120 I accept right on the spot. And did you feel 0:05:02.200 --> 0:05:05.440 you really wanted to go into that job again? I know, 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:08.640 up to that point in time, certainly no other you know, 0:05:08.839 --> 0:05:12.359 my lifestyle with service to the nation. Obviously I had 0:05:12.400 --> 0:05:14.120 to get out of out of the Marine Corps. I 0:05:14.160 --> 0:05:16.839 was getting too old and and whatnot. But the opportunity 0:05:16.880 --> 0:05:20.080 to serve was was something I really look forward to, 0:05:20.160 --> 0:05:21.920 and DHS was a great job. The men and women 0:05:21.920 --> 0:05:26.520 at DHS just phenomenal patriots and they're they're really unsung heroes. 0:05:26.600 --> 0:05:28.640 So you did that job for how long before you 0:05:28.839 --> 0:05:31.120 became chiefest right at six months? I left the job 0:05:31.160 --> 0:05:33.480 in the thirty one July. But did the President call 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:35.240 you a few times before and say I don't not 0:05:35.440 --> 0:05:37.279 don't like my chief of stafford and make a change. 0:05:37.320 --> 0:05:39.040 How did you get asked to do the chef of 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:40.960 staff job? It was, it was around It was a 0:05:41.000 --> 0:05:43.599 couple of days before it was announced. During my time 0:05:43.600 --> 0:05:45.039 at DHS, I didn't go to the White House a 0:05:45.040 --> 0:05:47.480 lot did need to. Most cabinet people are busy doing 0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:50.680 what they do. But he and I had a previous 0:05:50.720 --> 0:05:54.000 discussion on a couple of things that relative to the staff. Anyways, 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:55.520 he called me and said, hey, I really would like 0:05:55.560 --> 0:05:58.239 you to come on over and be the chief of staff. 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:00.840 I need you to need you in the leadership to 0:06:01.160 --> 0:06:04.280 UH and put this place in the direction. My wife 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:06.280 wouldn't want me to do this. It's a terrible job. 0:06:06.320 --> 0:06:08.040 I don't want to do this. I said, I really 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:11.920 like DHS. The people were making a difference. An awful 0:06:11.960 --> 0:06:15.520 lot of your agenda is wrapped up in UH DHS. 0:06:16.080 --> 0:06:18.200 But he said, I really need you to do this. 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:20.479 So I did it in prison asked, I did it. 0:06:21.080 --> 0:06:23.039 I'd like to talk about the job you did as 0:06:23.120 --> 0:06:25.839 chevas Tap before that I could talk about your background. 0:06:25.920 --> 0:06:28.599 So where are you are originally from? I grew up 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.200 in Boston, UM, and your family was a blue collar family, 0:06:32.560 --> 0:06:34.840 very very blue collar. So your dad was a World 0:06:34.880 --> 0:06:38.560 War two vet. Um, he worked two jobs in his 0:06:38.600 --> 0:06:43.600 old life, you know, maileman and railroad greatest man I Avenue. So, Um, 0:06:43.640 --> 0:06:46.400 you went to high school where St. Mary's High School 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:49.599 and just outside of Boston. And when you graduated, what 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:53.880 did you do? I went to almost a year of college. 0:06:54.000 --> 0:06:57.560 I had the war was graduating. N the war was 0:06:57.600 --> 0:07:00.880 on coming from the kind of neighborhoo I came from. 0:07:00.960 --> 0:07:03.000 I mean every man in my life growing up as 0:07:03.000 --> 0:07:05.960 a boy was either a World War Two vet or 0:07:06.000 --> 0:07:08.800 a Korean War vet. That's all they talked about. And 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:11.960 so that you know, we had a draft back then, 0:07:12.680 --> 0:07:14.600 it was relatively easy to get out of the draft. 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:17.200 I mean you just had to come in with a 0:07:17.240 --> 0:07:20.480 doctor's note or go to college and a lot of deferments. 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:22.600 I didn't want to get out, and so when I 0:07:22.640 --> 0:07:24.800 passed my draft physical, which would have brought me into 0:07:24.800 --> 0:07:27.280 the army, like most of the guys in my neighborhood 0:07:27.320 --> 0:07:29.600 went in the Marine Corps. I entered the Marine Corps, 0:07:29.640 --> 0:07:32.240 and you became a lieutenant or what was your I 0:07:32.280 --> 0:07:34.360 became a private. Well, I went from private to private 0:07:34.360 --> 0:07:39.640 first class. Ultimately, ultimately I made sergeant as an infantryman 0:07:39.840 --> 0:07:43.040 made sergeant. My mother was diagnosed with cancer. So I 0:07:43.040 --> 0:07:46.080 get out of the Marine Corps, but stayed in in 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:48.760 in a program that continued my training while I was 0:07:48.800 --> 0:07:51.360 going to college. And as soon as I graduated from 0:07:51.400 --> 0:07:54.840 college University of Massachusetts in Boston, I got commissioned, went 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:57.280 back to the Marine Corps and stayed forever. So the 0:07:57.320 --> 0:07:59.720 highest you can become early as a fourth star general 0:07:59.760 --> 0:08:01.840 star and you became a four star. John became a 0:08:01.840 --> 0:08:03.880 four star. Did you ever expect when you were just 0:08:04.320 --> 0:08:06.720 beginning in the Marine corps'd be a four star general? No? 0:08:06.960 --> 0:08:09.520 I mean when I was in an enlisted Marine I 0:08:09.560 --> 0:08:13.000 wanted to be hopefully a n c O. Someday that's corporal. 0:08:13.000 --> 0:08:16.320 I made sergeant. Fits held. Okay, so we're in the 0:08:16.360 --> 0:08:18.920 Marine Corps and as you rise up, eventually one of 0:08:18.960 --> 0:08:21.280 your assignments is to go into Iraq after the invasion 0:08:21.280 --> 0:08:24.600 in two thousand three, So you were in combat and 0:08:24.680 --> 0:08:27.000 you do you expect that you would survive. It was 0:08:27.040 --> 0:08:29.200 fairly dangerous. Well, it is day. I mean there's a 0:08:29.200 --> 0:08:31.960 lot of shooting and bombs and whatnot, but with marines, 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:34.640 and you take that on as as a as a possibility. 0:08:34.720 --> 0:08:37.239 But we were you know, we when we were designing 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:40.760 the campaign plan, uh, you know, one of the things 0:08:40.760 --> 0:08:44.079 we did was to you know, the the understand the 0:08:44.120 --> 0:08:47.400 Iraqi army was nothing is even close to us. But 0:08:47.440 --> 0:08:51.360 we designed a strategy that would minimize the amount of 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:53.720 damage to the country, in the amount of death to 0:08:53.760 --> 0:08:57.080 the Iraqi Army. We went there in our mindset was 0:08:57.120 --> 0:08:58.760 that we were there to We were not there to 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:01.040 conquer them, but to break them. So we didn't want 0:09:01.040 --> 0:09:02.320 to kill a lot of them, and I mean the 0:09:02.440 --> 0:09:04.840 army obviously, you'd always try to not kill the yet 0:09:05.200 --> 0:09:07.199 Rain Corps and the army going in, I think it 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:09.000 would all be over in one or two weeks, and 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:11.920 that people would be cheering you while they were cheering us, 0:09:12.280 --> 0:09:14.599 which was almost everywhere we went. They come out in 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:19.559 huge numbers. But the attack part of it, I mean 0:09:19.760 --> 0:09:21.600 was he in a sense was easy. We know where 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:23.480 we're gonna win, We're going to get the bad Dad 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:26.840 and you know, enlightening time. And but what we kept 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:29.520 asking in the Kuwait desert leading up to the invasion 0:09:29.520 --> 0:09:32.520 in March was who's going to take this over from us? 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:34.960 You know? Mr Rumsfeld had come out very strong and 0:09:34.960 --> 0:09:37.520 said we are not with the U. S. Military is 0:09:37.520 --> 0:09:40.439 not going to get involved in nation building. And our 0:09:40.559 --> 0:09:42.280 question was, Okay, who are we going to turn that 0:09:42.400 --> 0:09:46.160 over to? Because we should start thinking about that now. 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:50.480 And so the idea that we were going to leave quickly, 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:53.640 which we military did start to do, but not have 0:09:53.679 --> 0:09:56.040 anyone that turned it over. It was really that was 0:09:57.240 --> 0:09:59.959 caused us great concern as military men. So did men 0:10:00.160 --> 0:10:04.320 working for you get killed under you? And so what 0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:06.640 do you do in that situation? You you send a 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:10.040 letter to the next to ken or or how how 0:10:10.040 --> 0:10:14.200 do you deal with that emotionally? Yeah? Um, well, I 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:17.320 mean it's it's it's part of the it's part of 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:20.160 the lifestyle. It's not an easy part of the lifestyle. 0:10:20.200 --> 0:10:23.320 You know. When I was when I was a commander there, 0:10:23.800 --> 0:10:25.880 when I went back for a subsequent tour, I was 0:10:25.920 --> 0:10:30.040 the senior marine commander on the ground, and there are 0:10:30.080 --> 0:10:31.560 a lot of things that you might list that you 0:10:31.559 --> 0:10:33.320 would be woken up for in the middle of the night, 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:37.120 and I only had two of them. A missing American 0:10:38.400 --> 0:10:41.640 UM because then we had to go to general courts 0:10:41.679 --> 0:10:44.800 to find that person. Uh, and then a death and 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:47.720 people would say, why did you want to get woken 0:10:47.800 --> 0:10:50.760 up on the deaths? There's nothing you can do as well. 0:10:50.760 --> 0:10:54.480 I think I owe the marine sailor soldier in their 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:57.400 family at least to be woken up and someone to 0:10:57.440 --> 0:10:59.880 tell me this young man, this young woman just died 0:11:00.240 --> 0:11:02.760 in the defense of their country. Let's talk about when 0:11:02.760 --> 0:11:05.280 you after you retired. For a while, before you joined 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:07.920 the Trump administration, you were in the business world or 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:10.560 what were you doing? Not very much. I started working 0:11:10.600 --> 0:11:14.400 with the National Defense University UM, which is part of 0:11:14.480 --> 0:11:17.480 d O D. And then I just started to get 0:11:17.480 --> 0:11:20.319 a couple of opportunities to be on boards. I joined 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:22.679 those boards, but almost as soon as I joined them, 0:11:22.720 --> 0:11:26.760 I was I was disengaging because I had I was 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:28.960 in the process of going to DHS. Right. So you're 0:11:29.000 --> 0:11:31.559 on some corporate boards for the first time. You're making 0:11:31.920 --> 0:11:33.600 more money than brazilianly you made in the in the 0:11:33.600 --> 0:11:36.760 marine corps. Not huge money, so, but more than the 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:38.800 Marine Corps. All right, But so going back in the government, 0:11:38.840 --> 0:11:41.400 it was actually another cut in salary. But your family 0:11:41.440 --> 0:11:45.040 didn't say anything about that. I guess what was interesting 0:11:45.080 --> 0:11:51.240 going into DHS. It was about fifty thou dollars more 0:11:51.960 --> 0:11:56.000 than I made a year as as a as a 0:11:56.040 --> 0:11:59.080 four star. And then what I didn't know, and my 0:11:59.120 --> 0:12:01.240 wife said to me after a couple of weeks being 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:04.000 at the White House, she said, I think our pay 0:12:04.080 --> 0:12:07.120 is wrong because the paycheck is quite a bit smaller. 0:12:07.160 --> 0:12:09.560 I didn't realize that took a pretty major pay cut 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:11.920 to be the chief of STAF. Didn't ask the president. 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:16.480 Money is not relevant. So let's talk about your family 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:19.439 for a moment. When you're a fourth star, you're often 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:23.360 traveling all over the place, so h your wife gets 0:12:23.400 --> 0:12:25.400 to travel with you and some of your assignments or not. 0:12:25.480 --> 0:12:27.600 How many different places did you have to move as 0:12:27.640 --> 0:12:30.880 a as a general? Well, when I was my wife, 0:12:31.160 --> 0:12:36.320 she loved that question. Um. When I was at in Miami, 0:12:36.440 --> 0:12:40.320 my wife went to UH Guantanamo obey for three years 0:12:40.320 --> 0:12:42.559 so we could have Thanksgiving dinner with the troops down 0:12:42.640 --> 0:12:47.520 there at the detention facility. I took her to Haiti. 0:12:48.480 --> 0:12:54.240 I took her to Ondors once maybe twice, maybe Honduras 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:57.400 in Guatemala one each, and then once to Peru. What 0:12:57.520 --> 0:13:01.200 about Paris or London? None of that. And so you 0:13:01.280 --> 0:13:06.800 have three children, uh, your father three children? Right? Your 0:13:06.840 --> 0:13:09.600 oldest son is in the military still, he's a lieutenant 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:12.760 colonel in the Marine Corps, fairly recently promoted, just back 0:13:12.880 --> 0:13:16.600 from his one of his tours from in Iraq. And 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:18.920 you have a daughter, daughter, and what is she doing? 0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:21.319 But she was with the FBI prior to that, Actually 0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:26.480 she was. She was worked with these the wounded men 0:13:26.520 --> 0:13:29.679 and women, mostly men coming back from the wars at 0:13:29.880 --> 0:13:34.199 Bethesda Naval Hospital. And then she went into the FBI. 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:37.000 She was with the hostage rescue team as one of 0:13:37.040 --> 0:13:39.800 the support people for several years. And you have another 0:13:39.880 --> 0:13:43.000 son who lost his life in military combats. Right. He 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:46.199 was a started off as as an enlisted Marine and 0:13:46.240 --> 0:13:49.439 then became a second lieutenant and was killed in Afghanistan. 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:52.640 And h did you and your wife say having two 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:57.320 sons in the Marines was an awful sacrifice for any family? Now, 0:13:57.360 --> 0:14:00.200 it's our way of life. That may sound strange to 0:14:00.240 --> 0:14:02.720 the listeners, but it is a way of life, and 0:14:03.960 --> 0:14:07.120 they make their own to make their own decisions. What 0:14:07.120 --> 0:14:08.880 would you say is the best training to be chief 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.839 of staff in the White House, and particularly with President Trump? 0:14:11.840 --> 0:14:13.680 What do you think it's the best training? I think one, 0:14:13.720 --> 0:14:17.360 you've got to tell the boss the truth when when 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:19.240 you don't think he's going down the right road, not 0:14:19.320 --> 0:14:21.160 in front of a bunch of people, but when you 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:23.400 don't think he's going down the right road, to tell 0:14:23.440 --> 0:14:27.280 him that truth to pol right, someone in the room 0:14:27.520 --> 0:14:30.480 has got to say at the beginning of every conversation 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:33.480 and at the end, is this good for America? So 0:14:33.560 --> 0:14:37.240 let's go forward now to chief of staff? So you know, 0:14:37.320 --> 0:14:40.600 the chief of staff sounds like a good title. Everybody 0:14:40.640 --> 0:14:42.920 presuming in the government is responsive to you. You can 0:14:42.960 --> 0:14:44.800 call any cabinets secretary and tell him what to do. 0:14:44.920 --> 0:14:46.760 Is not the way it works. I would not say 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:49.720 I'd tell him what to do. I'd suggest, I mean 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:53.000 they are cabinet members. Uh. You know. The President puts 0:14:53.000 --> 0:14:55.480 out as you know. I mean, you don't whether it's 0:14:55.480 --> 0:14:58.080 tweets or just his his time with the press, and 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:00.400 he does a lot of discussion with the press. He 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:04.440 puts out his feelings on different things. More often than not, 0:15:04.520 --> 0:15:07.160 I would get calls from the cabinet people saying, hey, 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:09.360 I just heard him say. This is that a change? 0:15:09.440 --> 0:15:13.240 Should we react to it? Um So the President is 0:15:13.280 --> 0:15:16.520 never hesitant to to pick up the phone and talk 0:15:16.560 --> 0:15:18.360 to his own cabinet members. And would you ever say 0:15:18.400 --> 0:15:20.920 the President, maybe the tweets are too much to keep 0:15:21.000 --> 0:15:23.680 up with, or maybe you shouldn't tweet as much. Never did. 0:15:24.640 --> 0:15:28.520 The President feels very very strongly, whether you agree with 0:15:28.520 --> 0:15:32.320 this or not, very strongly that he's not dealt with 0:15:32.400 --> 0:15:37.720 by the press fairly, and that his tweeting goes around 0:15:37.720 --> 0:15:40.320 the press and gets his his agenda out, his word 0:15:40.320 --> 0:15:45.280 out to the world without having to rely on a 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:47.840 press conference. Now, let's talk about a few substance issues. 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:50.720 Early in the administration, when you were at the Department 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:54.360 of Homeland Security, there was the issue of immigration, the 0:15:54.440 --> 0:15:57.120 ban on immigration and so forth. Were you alerted to 0:15:57.200 --> 0:15:59.000 that when you were there, And how do you think 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:02.120 that ultimately it is now working out? Just a couple 0:16:02.120 --> 0:16:06.040 of three days after I became the DHS secretary, the 0:16:06.040 --> 0:16:09.920 EO came out on the so called travel ban. And 0:16:10.240 --> 0:16:13.000 you know, as a sidebar, I would say that the 0:16:13.080 --> 0:16:18.840 countries and the seven countries involved. Uh in the President's thinking, Uh, 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:23.360 we're all dysfunctional, you know, I mean around you know, 0:16:23.760 --> 0:16:26.240 everyone knows it's a hot bit of terrorism. The other 0:16:26.240 --> 0:16:32.000 countries were dysfunctional. Uh. The entire population of Muslim population 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:35.320 of those countries added up to about the world's population. 0:16:35.360 --> 0:16:38.800 The point is those countries we had, they don't have 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:42.520 a process that we could bless and say. The people 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:44.760 that they say are coming out of those countries to 0:16:44.840 --> 0:16:47.240 come to the United States for whatever reason, there's no 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:50.080 way to really tell who they are because these countries 0:16:50.120 --> 0:16:52.120 are in a state of collapse. It could have been 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:56.760 done better. Back to David, the staff process, if that 0:16:56.880 --> 0:17:00.760 had been when I was there, say several months later, 0:17:01.520 --> 0:17:03.680 the idea that the President might want to do that, 0:17:03.720 --> 0:17:06.840 and he has strong feelings on immigration, we all know that. Uh. 0:17:07.000 --> 0:17:10.760 We had run that through this process and uh and 0:17:10.760 --> 0:17:13.680 and and at least had a better release plan. When 0:17:13.680 --> 0:17:15.439 you were at the White House, you also had the 0:17:15.480 --> 0:17:18.240 wall issue. President really wanted to build a wall. You 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:20.160 were quoted a few times and saying, well, it doesn't 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:22.960 have to be a concrete wall, can be see through 0:17:23.040 --> 0:17:25.199 or something like that. Was there a difference between you 0:17:25.240 --> 0:17:27.040 and the president on that, and do you think the 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:29.400 wall is a good policy. When I got the DHS, 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:32.000 I went to the experts, the Customs of Border Protection 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:34.600 people that that men, you know, the bastion down there, 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:37.320 that man the watched our on the and said do 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:40.240 we need a wall? And they said, or some physical barrier? 0:17:40.720 --> 0:17:44.760 The university said we need more we have. Remember back 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:49.920 in I think two thousand six, the Congress authorized over 0:17:50.000 --> 0:17:55.320 six fifty miles of wall and UH Senators Clinton, Schumer, 0:17:55.760 --> 0:17:58.720 and Obama all voted for it. So that was in 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:01.720 two thousand six, six hundred fifty miles. What we what 0:18:01.840 --> 0:18:04.360 the CVP people would tell the me is we want 0:18:04.359 --> 0:18:08.560 to improve that barrier, and we can give you if 0:18:08.560 --> 0:18:10.680 you If you tell me I can get miles, I 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:12.480 can tell you exactly where to put it. If you 0:18:12.560 --> 0:18:14.320 tell me I can have a thousand more miles, I'll 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:17.320 tell you exactly where I want it. They also said 0:18:18.040 --> 0:18:19.480 that we want to be able to see through the 0:18:19.480 --> 0:18:22.400 wall because we want to be able to track what's 0:18:22.400 --> 0:18:24.399 going on on the other side. And just as importantly, 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:27.639 according to them, and they're their experts, we want the 0:18:27.680 --> 0:18:30.360 people that are contemplating jumping the wall to see us, 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:33.720 because if they see us, they don't do it. Now, 0:18:33.840 --> 0:18:37.159 he had a meeting twice. He met twice with the 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:40.199 leader of North Korea. Did you and I think that 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:42.960 was a good idea to meet without advanced preparation about 0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:45.159 what would happen? And do you think the policy of 0:18:45.240 --> 0:18:48.080 meeting actually usually works or you should always have advanced 0:18:48.080 --> 0:18:50.320 preparation when you have these summit meetings. There's a lot 0:18:50.320 --> 0:18:53.080 of advanced preparation. There's a lot of advanced preparation, a 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:56.720 lot of letters back and forth. People at State and 0:18:56.800 --> 0:19:02.199 other places have their context there. But I'll applaud the 0:19:02.200 --> 0:19:05.720 President in that he looked back on the last I 0:19:05.720 --> 0:19:09.359 don't know, seventy years of trying to deal with the 0:19:09.400 --> 0:19:13.240 North Korean leadership and none of that was working. And 0:19:13.320 --> 0:19:16.640 he's the kind of guy I grew to know that 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:20.600 wanted to um have tried personally. So I'll pick the 0:19:20.640 --> 0:19:23.040 phone up and talk to the guy I want to 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:25.800 meet with him and try to develop a relationship. And 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:28.760 that's that's who he is. But I think many times 0:19:28.760 --> 0:19:31.879 it was all the other stuff hasn't worked for seventy years, 0:19:32.320 --> 0:19:34.199 But the heck clicks. Let's give it a try. Some 0:19:34.240 --> 0:19:37.280 people would say the president was very reluctant to criticize 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:41.120 Putin for anything, and he seemed overly friendly with him 0:19:41.200 --> 0:19:43.840 compared to other presidents. Do you think that's a fair 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:47.240 comment and why do you think it was? Well, the explanations. 0:19:47.320 --> 0:19:50.840 It's much like with Kim I mean, he he things 0:19:50.880 --> 0:19:55.159 had not been working very well over the last thirty 0:19:55.200 --> 0:19:59.959 five years, and he is you know, he's again He's 0:20:00.000 --> 0:20:01.720 to pick the phone up and talk to the guy 0:20:01.800 --> 0:20:04.240 kind of guy. Was it complicated to have the president's 0:20:04.320 --> 0:20:08.080 family in the government at the time. There is an 0:20:08.080 --> 0:20:10.520 influence that has to be has to be dealt with 0:20:11.440 --> 0:20:14.920 and today if you were I don't mean by no means, 0:20:14.960 --> 0:20:19.600 I mean Mrs Trump first, ladies a wonderful person. If 0:20:19.640 --> 0:20:23.680