‘This should terrify you’: Democrats warn Americans about Trump’s access to nuclear power
Donald Trump was President of the United States after the 2016 election and we feared what he’d do with nuclear weapons. He’s back after his win against Vice President Kamala Harris and that fear is creeping back in.
Now, Representative Ed Markey is working with Representative Ted Lieu to try and keep absolute power out of the President’s hands. Markey and Lieu have been pushing to put up requirements that would take away the presidential authority to start a nuclear war. Markey shared on X his thoughts about the situation.
“Come January, Donald Trump will have the sole authority to launch a nuclear strike. This should terrify you. That’s why Representative Ted Lieu and I are urging POTUS to put guardrails on presidential authority to start nuclear war.”
Markey also shared an article by Common Dreams about the push to change the system while President Joe Biden is still in office. Markey wrote: “We must take the power to start a nuclear war out of the hands of a single individual.”
Of course Trump supporters were angry that Markey is pushing this now and not when Biden was heading into office. One even wrote that it would make more sense to do this back in 2021. Another acted like we should have been concerned with Biden and his use of nuclear weapons. Biden is currently a month out from no longer being President. I think it is safe to say that he was not a “going to start a nuclear war” concern.
Trump, on the other hand, is a completely different situation. And while yes, we did survive four years of his presidency prior, he is someone who has proven himself to be hot headed in the past, especially with world leaders.
We do have one saving grace
In the past, Trump has had a more logic approach to nuclear war (shocking, I know). While many of his MAGA fans responded to Markey’s fears with mockery, what Trump has said in the past about nuclear power and the threat of a nuclear war is a bit more coherent than some of his other nonsense. According to Fox News, Trump said earlier this year that he views nuclear weapons as a major threat.
“To me, we have one really major threat: That’s called nuclear weapons,” Trump said. “This isn’t Army tanks going back and forth and shooting at each other. This is obliteration. We have incredible stuff, so does Russia. China has much less but will catch up,” Trump said, going on to call it the “single biggest threat by far to civilization.”
What’s the saying? Even the people who hate are right sometimes? That’s what is happening here, unfortunately. He’s right (that hurts me to say) about this because a nuclear war helps no one. Not the country that drops the bombs, not the people in the line of fire. It is just horrifying and destructive any way you look at it. So I do think that Markey’s plan is a good one to implement but it also doesn’t seem like Trump is into the idea of a nuclear war.
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