Donald Trump Jr. has said the Taliban respected his father's "strength" and the former president had the "brainpower" necessary to negotiate with the group that now controls most of Afghanistan.
Former President Donald Trump's eldest son told Fox News' Sean Hannity on Wednesday that his father "exuded strength" and said President Joe Biden was weak in comparison.
The Trump administration negotiated the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2020 and Biden has received significant criticism for how the final drawdown was carried out.
Hannity asked Trump Jr. about the situation in Afghanistan: "What would your dad do?"
"The only thing these animals respect and understand is strength, and Joe Biden exudes nothing but weakness. Donald Trump exuded strength, so they knew he was not someone to be trifled with," Trump Jr. said.
"They knew he was not someone to mess with."
"Donald Trump also had the brainpower to actually negotiate like a real businessman, not a bureaucrat politician with no real world experience," Trump Jr. went on.
"He wouldn't have walked away without having conditions met. He wouldn't have given them—I've read—65 billion in U.S. equipment. He wouldn't have allowed that and they wouldn't have even thought to mess with him," he said.
It's not clear where Trump Jr. derived that $65 billion figure from. He has previously wrongly claimed that the equipment left in Afghanistan was worth $85 billion. Though a full accounting of the equipment hasn't been done, experts have estimated it could be valued at less than $10 billion.
"When I watch the secretary of state [Antony Blinken] and these other clowns—'We're really shocked that the Taliban doesn't have an inclusive and diverse cabinet'. I mean, what... This is a clown show," Trump Jr. said.
"My kindergarteners would have known this when they were in kindergarten. It is so absurd that this is the stuff that they're pushing and I guess it explains it because it's the only thing that matters is checking off a lot of boxes."
"They spend a lot of time bragging about having the most diverse cabinet in the history of America. Look what it's gotten us—because they're actually not hiring competent people," Trump Jr. went on.
"They're checking off boxes arbitrarily and they're putting in clowns that have no business having American lives—the American economy—in the palm of their hands because you see exactly what they're doing [with] it—they're destroying it all," he said.
The Taliban swept across Afghanistan in the days before the final U.S. withdrawal on August 31 and now control most of the country. However, resistance fighters in the country's Panjshir Valley are continuing to hold out.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Darragh Roche is a U.S. News Reporter based in Limerick, Ireland. His focus is reporting on U.S. politics. He has ... Read more
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