The president returns to West Point having transformed his relationship with the armed forces.
The last time President Donald Trump addressed Army cadets at West Point, he was locked in a dramatic conflict with America’s military establishment.
Two days before Trump spoke to the academy’s graduates in June 2020, Army General Mark Milley, the nation’s top military officer, had made an extraordinary televised apology for having appeared in uniform with the president outside the White House, after security personnel used force to clear peaceful protesters from the scene.
Two weeks before Trump’s commencement address, Defense Secretary Mark Esper had made what turned out to be an irreparable break with the president when he pushed back on Trump’s desire to use active-duty troops to put down unrest triggered by the killing of George Floyd. Trump had mused about shooting protesters in the legs, according to Esper, who later wrote, “What transpired that day would leave me deeply troubled about the leader of our country and the decisions he was making.” Trump, who denied suggesting that protesters be shot, fired Esper five months later.
Trump’s impulse to enlist the military to respond to nationwide protests generated an outcry from some retired officers, who denounced what they saw as presidential overreach. Most notably, James Mattis, who as Trump’s first defense secretary had tried to steer the president away from decisions he feared would endanger allies or undermine U.S. security, decried Trump’s effort to politicize the military and divide Americans.
That now feels like a different era.
As he returns to West Point to speak at the academy’s commencement today, Trump faces little resistance from the Defense Department. Instead, in selecting civilian leaders at the Pentagon, the president has prioritized perceived loyalty rather than experience. In doing so, he has brought the Defense Department much closer in line with his MAGA political agenda than it was in his first term, and raised questions about who, if anyone, will attempt to stop him if he tries to use the military in unconstitutional ways.
Unlike Mattis, Milley, and Esper, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth—a former Fox News host and National Guard soldier with little management background—has acted as an accelerant for Trump’s political priorities.
