The Republicans Running to Support Donald Trump

Across the country, candidates who support Donald Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election are running for office, promising to replace fellow-Republicans who went along with certifying last year’s results. Republicans are favored to take back both houses of Congress in 2022 and tighten their grip on state houses, raising urgent questions about whether the Party, which largely proved unwilling to support Donald Trump’s push to overturn the election last year, might be more amenable to doing so in 2024.

One of those candidates is Don Bolduc, a retired Army general and the only Republican who has declared his candidacy for next year’s U.S. Senate race in New Hampshire against the Democratic incumbent, Maggie Hassan. Establishment Republicans in Washington are hoping that New Hampshire’s governor, Chris Sununu, will also challenge Hassan, in part because Bolduc has firmly attached himself to Trump, praising the former President frequently and signing a letter with other former military leaders claiming election fraud. Trump has not yet endorsed a candidate in the race, but he recently released a statement praising Bolduc’s attacks on General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Trump and Biden.

Bolduc’s hard right turn follows a storied career in the military, during which he served as a Green Beret in Afghanistan and commanded Special Operations Forces in Africa. After multiple combat deployments, Bolduc reported that he suffered from P.T.S.D. and a traumatic brain injury, leading him to undergo years of treatment; he became an advocate for more understanding of soldiers and veterans with mental-health-related issues. I recently spoke with Bolduc by phone about his military career and his decision to run for Senate. I wanted to understand just how far the next crop of conservative candidates might go in their loyalty to Trump. During our conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity, we also discussed the events of January 6th, his recent conversation with the former President, and his vision for the future of the Republican Party.

What is it that you want to bring to the Senate?

I believe that I’m going to bring effective leadership to the United States Senate, along with a grassroots mentality that doesn’t exist there right now, and a non-career-politician view. Even though I am a Republican, I find the political-party system to be very corrupt, dysfunctional, and it creates a lot of problems for the American people. I’m not tied to the establishment, so I get to be somebody who represents the people that sent them there, and not special interests and lobbyists that a lot of these Senators are tied to.

This reminds me a little bit of former President Trump. Can you talk about his appeal?

I think that President Trump’s appeal, certainly for me, was exactly that. In addition to that, I felt that my values and principles as an American, and the Constitution, which I served for thirty-three-plus years in the military, was safe with President Trump. I didn’t think so with President Biden.

Do you think that that stems from Trump’s reading and understanding of the Constitution?

I think so. I think it goes with the fact that President Trump does respect the American philosophy, which is based in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. He’s not a career politician, because I honestly believe that career politicians, over time, drift further and further away from the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

Even though he was a multibillionaire, my sense with him was that he was more in touch with the American culture than you see with a lot of the politicians. He was, like all of us, very concerned about what professional athletes did by kneeling to the American flag. He spoke out about that, where a lot of other career politicians wouldn’t do that. I think President Trump also has a better understanding of American history and how American history is supposed to play itself out. We’re supposed to use our history to make the future better, and I think he was very focussed on making the future better.

You and some other retired military leaders recently signed a letter about election fraud. Can you tell me why you signed that letter, and what its importance is?

I signed that letter because I thought there was a tremendous amount of fraud. My initial perspective was from New Hampshire, right? We’ve had a significant amount of fraud here. Our governor is in denial, in large part because he benefits from it, and so do all the federal Democratic incumbents. They all benefitted from it. Statistically, they won by margins that were mathematically impossible and defied common sense.

When I’m travelling around all ten counties, the No. 1 question I get is this: “I understand why you’re running. I agree with your whys. However, we can’t win. It’s rigged. Why would someone like you want to subject themselves to a process that is, by its very definition and character, unfair, and you don’t have a chance?” That’s the No. 1 question I get. Isn’t that amazing?

It is. I have a theory I want to run by you. I hear a lot of Republicans in Washington talking about voter fraud or a rigged election, but they don’t really mean it. They’re just trying to go along with President Trump, because they think that they need to do that to survive, but it seems like you are much more sincere about it, that you really feel that this stuff happened.

I do. I very much believe it and I think it exists, and I think it happens and it’s been happening for a long time in this country. When you try to steal the Presidency, a lot of people are going to go, “O.K., wait a minute. What the hell’s going on here?”

Waterville Valley, in the state of New Hampshire, had a-hundred-and-ninety-four-per-cent voter turnout. How can that be? How can you have over a hundred per cent of people in Waterville Valley voting? [Bolduc told The New Yorker that he was citing preliminary statistics from a Facebook group of amateur canvassers.] You can’t. It’s impossible. That’s just one, and there are a number of places across New Hampshire that have overages in the number of people in their town, the number of people registered, compared to the number of people that voted. That doesn’t make sense.

Let’s go back to my theory about how you’re one of these people who is very sincere in your beliefs, because we saw with Republican Senators that a lot of them made noises about, Oh, maybe there’s some voter fraud. But almost all of them voted to certify the election. It seems like you’re saying to the people of New Hampshire that if you are elected in 2022, and are serving in 2024, when certification comes before the Senate again, you wouldn’t just talk the talk—you would walk the walk. Is that accurate?

Oh, absolutely it’s accurate. Everybody I talk to believes that in me. They tell me. They go, “I believe you’re going to do what you’re doing. I believe that you speak from the heart. I believe that you believe in God, family, community, country, that you believe our institutions have been undermined over the last fifty years, and we fundamentally have to get people back in office that come from the people, that relate to the people, and, oh, by the way, don’t want to be career politicians and will come home after they serve two terms.” They’re absolutely right.

How should we as a society think about what occurred on January 6th? How do you think about it?

I think of it as a complete failure of the political system, the leadership in Congress—the Speaker of the House, the Senate Majority Leader, the Minority Leader.

The Vice President?

Yeah. All of that. I think it is a huge—it’s on them, right? It’s not on the people that were there. It’s on them. They failed us, and so, therefore, now they’re trying to politicize it, turn it into something that it’s not.

The people who breached Congress and got in, threatening congressmen, how should we think about them?

Well, honestly, I do not think that we should be using violence, destroying property, and so on and so forth, and running around and taking pictures in people’s offices. I certainly don’t agree with that, but they believed that their rights were violated. They believed that they lost their voice.

I want to ask you about your previous career in the military. You were one of the people who talked the most about the importance of mental health for our men and women serving and for veterans. Can you talk about why that issue is and was so important to you?

Well, first and foremost, it was important to me because I came to the conclusion that we weren’t providing for the health and welfare—for mental injuries, physical injuries, and spiritual health—of our service members and their families. I based this off the fact that we were experiencing high levels of alcohol and drug use, that we were experiencing bad behavior in the workplace, that good order and discipline were slipping, that guys were making poor decisions when they were down, when they would deploy. I thought to myself, I had the honor of commanding Special Forces, Navy SEALs, Marine Special Operations, Air Force Special Operations, these élite service members. I just can’t pass it off to indiscipline.

We started looking at it, and we came to the conclusion that it might damn well be that they’re self-medicating because they have post-traumatic stress or traumatic brain injuries, and they haven’t been given the therapy and coping mechanisms they need. We put together a program and we found that to be true. The feedback from the families was incredible. I said, “Hey, we’ve got a winner here. This answers a lot of questions.”

I didn’t realize the pushback I was going to get from the institutional military. They told me, “We don’t talk about these things. The more you talk about it, the more problems you have.” Of course, I didn’t agree with that. They told me it wasn’t going to bode well for my command. I said, “I’m not doing this for my command or my promotion or whatever. I’m doing it because I see it as my responsibility. It should be our responsibility if we’re going to have a more resilient force. We’ve got to take care of our people in our family.” I kept doing it, even when it was against D.O.D. policy and the culture of the general staff.

It’s moving to hear you talk about mental health, and it’s important. I know that Trump got some criticism back in 2015 for making comments about P.O.W.s. Is that something that you worry he doesn’t understand?

I think he understands it now. A lot of people don’t understand it. I think there’s a lot of confusion out there. I think a lot of people don’t know. I think initially the President may not have been as well informed about it, but I think today he’s much better informed about it. We’ve got to cut everybody some slack for not knowing something. It’s the follow-on actions that you have to pay attention to: “Hey, am I going to say the same stupid thing twice, or am I going to learn?”

Everything is politicized, right? Everybody forgets the human aspects of things, and they just use it against people over and over and over again. It’s got us in a place right now where, in one venue here in New Hampshire, I am an American hero, a brave leader, and someone who served his country with honor. When I go into a political venue, I get characterized as the exact opposite of that.

Astonishing.

How could it be both? Right? It can’t be both.

Do you think there’s any role for the military to play if another election, as you see it, is stolen?

Well, I think there’s always a role for the military to play if there is a threat to the existence of our government and our Constitution and the oath that we take. Absolutely. That’s written in, right? Whatever the trigger is that would set off the destruction of our nation, our Constitution, and the oath that we take, we have an obligation to say, “O.K., wait a minute. No way. That’s not going to happen.”

Have you had any contact with the former President? I know he released a statement praising your comments about General Milley. Are you hoping for an endorsement at some point?

The President called, what, two weeks ago. We had about a fifteen-minute conversation. It was a great conversation about the economy, the fiscal situation. We covered a lot of different topics. I had never talked to the President before, so I was honored to get his call, and I am doing everything I possibly can to earn his endorsement. I feel optimistic about it.

I have to say, I came into this conversation thinking, He’s a respected former general—he probably doesn’t believe all this stuff about Trump and voter fraud. But your sincerity has really surprised me, and it shows, I think, the types of people that the former President would like to see in Washington going forward, especially if he’s going to run again.

Yes, exactly. I mean, whatever President Trump decides to do, he’ll have my full support. Whatever that means. I’m just a little guy, but, based off what we’re talking about, I want you to know that, whatever he decides to do, he’ll have my full support.

Yes, and I think it’s really important for people to think about what types of Republicans are elected, knowing that Trump may run again.

I agree with you a hundred per cent.