Ex-official penned critique of Trump
Former DHS aide Taylor says he was ‘Anonymous’
WASHINGTON – Former administration official Miles Taylor revealed himself Wednesday as the anonymous author of a scathing opinion piece and book about President Donald Trump, stepping forward six days before the election to endorse Democratic challenger Joe Biden.
“This election is a two-part referendum: first, on the character of a man, and second, on the character of our nation,” said Taylor, a former chief of staff at the Department of Homeland Security.
In a statement, Taylor added: “That’s why I’m also urging fellow Republicans to put country over party, even if that means supporting Trump’s Democratic opponent.”
Writing under the pen name “Anonymous,” Taylor authored a 2018 newspaper column and 2019 book that attacked Trump’s leadership and described utter dysfunction within his administration.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany described Taylor as a “low-level, disgruntled former staffer,” as well as “a liar and a coward who chose anonymity over action and leaking over leading.”
In the book, titled “A Warning,” the
self-proclaimed member of the “resistance” said Cabinet members considered mass resignations or invoking the 25th Amendment as possible ways to remove Trump from office.
The author also suggested that Trump might refuse to leave office, even if he is defeated for reelection. The author said that is why Trump talks about “coups,” saying he is “seeding the narrative for his followers” that he is being unfairly forced from office.
“He will not exit quietly – or easily,” Anonymous wrote.
Some Republicans noted that Taylor, one of several ex-staffers to speak out against Trump in recent months, publicly endorsed Biden back in August – and at the time denied he was “Anonymous.” They also described him as a little-known staffer seeking to make a name for himself at Trump’s expense.
“I had never heard of Miles Taylor, but did ask around and heard back that he was a major self-promoter,” said Brendan Buck, a former spokesman for GOP House Speakers John Boehner and Paul Ryan. “Makes sense now.”
Trump himself has described the then-unknown author as a “gutless coward.”
Taylor’s book compared Trump to “a twelve-year-old in an air traffic control tower, pushing the buttons of government indiscriminately, indifferent to the planes skidding across the runway and the flights frantically diverting away from the airport.”
The book was a follow-up to a New York Times column of September 2018 in which Anonymous claimed to be “part of the resistance insider the Trump Administration.”
The author wrote that “many of the senior officials in his own administration are working diligently from within to frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations.”
White House officials disputed the author’s characterization of Trump and assailed his long-running efforts to shield his identity.
Former Republican Congressman Joe Walsh, a Trump critic, said the author should have come forward sooner, at least before early voting in various states.
“70m people
Walsh tweeted. damn many of have already voted,” “There are just too us who lost EVERY
THING over the past few years publicly opposing this unfit monster in the White House. I don’t give a damn anymore about ‘anonymous.’ ”
Taylor, who resigned from the Department of Homeland Security in June of 2019, spoke out against the president in a video released Aug. 17 by an organization called Republican Voters Against Trump.
Taylor said Trump would give illegal orders to DHS and “didn’t want us to tell him it was illegal anymore because he knew that … he had ‘magical authorities.’ ”
In subsequent interviews, Taylor denied he was Anonymous – until Wednesday.
In his statement, Taylor repeated his assertion that his New York Times column was wrong in one respect: “The country cannot rely on well-intentioned, unelected bureaucrats around the President to steer him toward what’s right. He has purged most of them anyway.”
Nor can Congress, he said; it is up to voters to make the final judgment on Trump. “He doesn’t deserve a second term in office,” Taylor wrote, “and we don’t deserve to live through it.”
Said Taylor: “We’ve perpetuated the seemingly endless hostility stoked by this divisive President, so if we really want to restore vibrance to our civic life, the change must begin with each of us, not just with the occupant of the Oval Office.”