Former President Trump suggested shooting racial justice protesters when the demonstrations neared the White House, former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper writes in a new memoir.

“Can’t you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something?” Trump asked the newly appointed Esper in a tense Oval Office meeting on June 1, 2020, the cabinet member wrote.


Esper, who was abruptly fired by Trump after Election Day, recalled the “surreal” experience of hearing the commander-in-chief discuss opening fire on American protesters.

“(I was) sitting in front of the Resolute desk, inside the Oval Office, with this idea weighing heavily in the air, and the president red-faced and complaining loudly about the protests underway in Washington, D.C.,” Esper wrote.

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