Retired Army Col. Douglas MacGregor has a history of grossly Islamophobic and anti-immigrant comments, with many focusing on Muslim migrants to Europe, and he has criticized Germany for offering assistance to “millions of unwanted Muslim invaders.” So of course Donald Trump has nominated him to be ambassador to Germany.
MacGregor’s comments were reported by CNN’s KFile as his nomination is pending and as Trump announced a plan to withdraw nearly 12,000 troops from Germany. That move is widely seen as benefiting Russia, and guess what: MacGregor went on Russian state-controlled TV network RT in 2014 as Russia was trying to annex Crimea from Ukraine and called Eastern Ukrainians “Russians.”
MacGregor’s comments specifically about Germany, as reported by CNN, include:
- “The Germans, like the Koreans and the Japanese, are tired of this American troop presence on their soil. And I think that if you want the Germans to step up and assert themselves as the great power that they are, one of the first steps in that direction is to change our relationship with Germany in terms of military power. Make it clear to them that we are not going to be the first responder.”
- ”The Germans, thanks to us, don't feel obligated to defend themselves. And the President has simply said, 'look, why should the American taxpayer defend you if you aren't willing to defend yourself?”
- ”These people [Muslim migrants] are not coming to assimilate and become part of Europe. They're coming to benefit to consume and to establish themselves inside other people's countries with the goal of eventually turning Europe into an Islamic state. That's a bad thing for the West. It's a bad thing for Europeans.”
- ”[Germany is] spending money, but they have practically no armed forces, their army, their air force, both are terribly demoralized. I know many, many men who were in those armed forces in Germany, and that's a function of this extremely bizarre government that seems more concerned about providing free services to millions of unwanted Muslim invaders, to be blunt, than it does about its own armed forces in the defense of its country.” (Gee, do you think we should maybe talk about the history of why it’s not seen as a great idea for Germany to have a large, powerful military?)
Of course, his offensive comments aren’t all about Muslim migrants in Europe. MacGregor has also had plenty of terrible things to say about immigrants coming to the U.S.-Mexico border, including comments like “the only solution is martial law on the border, putting the United States Army in charge of it and closing it off would take about 30, 40,000 troops. We're talking about the regular army. You need robust rules of engagement. That means that you can shoot people as required if your life is in danger.”
This guy is supposedly going to be a diplomat in a country he’s repeatedly insulted. It’s very typical of the Trump administration’s approach to relationships with world powers, but the Senate should absolutely not confirm MacGregor.