Trump privately praised “Hitler’s generals.”

In 2021, Donald Trump's spokesman denied that the former Republican president ever made positive comments about Adolf Hitler. More than three years later, these denials are becoming increasingly difficult to believe. A new report from The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg contained the following:

As he did three years ago, a Trump spokesman told The Atlantic that the quote was “absolutely false,” adding that the former president “never said that.”

However, retired Gen. John Kelly — Trump's former homeland security secretary and former White House chief of staff — made comments to Goldberg on the record. From the report:

Kelly went on to tell Goldberg, again on the record, that the former president “used those terms Idiot And loser to describe soldiers who gave their lives defending our country. There are many, many people who have heard him say these things.”

If recent history is any guide, the GOP nominee will almost certainly go wild for the man who has served at his right wing for most of his presidency – he has already publicly called the retired general “stupid” and ” “a lowlife with a very bad reputation” means “small brain and a very big mouth” – although Kelly has been eager to talk about this and related topics for some time.

For his book “The Return of the Great Powers,” Kelly told reporter Jim Sciutto that Trump had said privately that Hitler “did some good things.” For their book “The Divider,” the retired general also told Peter Baker and Susan Glasser that he wanted Kelly and his colleagues to be more like “the German generals.”

When Kelly asked Trump for clarification, the then-president reportedly responded by stating, “The German generals in World War II.”

It now appears that the former White House chief of staff is making his experiences at Trump's side even clearer.

This is, of course, the same Kelly who, after working closely with Trump, said the Republican was guilty of “poisoning people's minds,” having “serious character problems” and not being a “real man.”

Kelly has also said that Trump has “no idea what America stands for and what America is about” and has “nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our Constitution and the rule of law.”

Additionally, Kelly told The New York Times in 2022 that during his presidency, Trump directed his chief of staff to use the Internal Revenue Service and the Justice Department to target his critics and perceived political enemies.

The Times report continued: “Mr. Kelly said he made it clear to Mr. Trump that there were serious legal and ethical problems with what he wanted.” The then-president made the demands “regularly” anyway.

With two weeks to go until Election Day 2024, it appears the retired general isn't quite done shedding light on what he knows about his former boss' perspective.

This post updates our relevant previous reporting.