“I think they think he’s a fool, frankly.” – Former Nixon White House Counsel John Dean on how he thinks world leaders see Trump
Critics of Trump and his failed administration are coming out of the woodwork to include John Dean, former White House Council for President Nixon, who expressed his views on Trump’s administration so far and his reputation across the world in a stinging interview earlier this week.
Referring to Trump’s recent remarks about North Korea, banking and the Civil War, Tur asked Dean if “the pressures of the White House are causing Donald Trump to act erratically or is it something else?”
“It’s hard to get inside his mind, but we’re beginning to get used to his patterns and they are predictably unpredictable” Dean responded. “What I find fascinating is his total ignorance on so many issues.”
Continuing, he stated that “[Trump] is all over the lot on every issue. I found a fascinating piece in The Times this morning by Charles Blow about his language level being that of roughly a sixth to eighth grader and probably on the slow end of that. So we’ve got a real problem with this president.”
Asked what foreign leaders think of Trump, Dean said that: “I think they think he’s a fool, frankly. I think most of the world leaders are wondering what in the world has happened to the United States, that someone like Donald Trump is the president. And we’re gonna pay a price for it sometime, somewhere along the line of his presidency.”
This sentiment echoes remarks he wrote for an opinion piece published by Newsweek in April.
Writing of Trump’s botched transition and first few months in office, Dean wrote:
The closer I have looked at his infant presidency, the more apparent it is that he simply does not know what he is doing, nor do most of those around him. It appears he and his aides have little knowledge of past presidencies.
Much of the blundering of his presidency, like that of his campaign and presidential transition, is the result of sheer ignorance. Unlike his predecessors who had some knowledge of the presidency, Trump had almost none.
Unlike predecessors who appreciated they did not understand the ways of Washington, so they hired people who did, Trump may have so little understanding of the presidency that he does not appreciate how difficult a job it can be, so he is simply winging it.
You can watch Dean’s full interview with Tur in the clip below.
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