Bill Bratton talks about Donald Trump on Wednesday. NYPD commissioner: Trump ‘scares the hell out of me’

Donald Trump doesn’t just strike fear into Bill Bratton. He “scares the hell out of me,” the retiring New York Police Department commissioner said Wednesday.

“Mr. Trump scares me — scares the hell out of me, to be quite frank with you and personal opinion,” Bratton told “CBS This Morning.” “I just don't get it in terms of the support for him.”


Bratton, a military veteran, also said he was “amazed that veterans groups are so charmed by him” and called his Purple Heart episode “appalling.”

At a rally in Ashburn, Virginia, on Tuesday, the Republican presidential nominee told the crowd that a retired lieutenant colonel who supports his campaign had presented him with a Purple Heart as a gift.

“I said: ‘Man, that’s like big stuff. I always wanted to get the Purple Heart,’” Trump said. “This was much easier.”

Bratton accused Trump of “demeaning” the medal, which is awarded to those wounded in combat. The real estate mogul gave “no recognition of the significance of that medal or the meaning of it,” Bratton said. “There’s no sensitivity there.”

But Trump’s “lack of depth” on policy issues and his “shoot from the hip” style are what scare Bratton, he said. “I just watched this whole campaign and I just shake my head. Again, a personal opinion,” he said, noting that he’s been in public life for nearly five decades. “And I just — I don't get it.”

He also echoed President Barack Obama’s criticism that Trump is unfit for the Oval Office. At a bilateral news conference on Tuesday, Obama called Trump “unfit to serve in any office” and “woefully unprepared” for the presidency.

“That’s my belief,” Bratton added. “That is my belief.”

And he mocked Trump for being a so-called “tough guy,” questioning whether the billionaire businessman has ever taken a punch — “an actual, physical punch,” he said.

“I’m always amazed by people who are portrayed as tough guys or portray themselves as tough. It’s easy to be tough,” he said. “It really is easy to be tough. It’s a lot tougher being soft and understanding when you need to be soft, like the apology to this family. What would be the harm of rather than taking offense that they said something bad about you, to understand their pain? Isn’t that the issue? There’s no compassion there. It's all about him and never about anybody else. You know, strange times.”

Bratton has taken a job at Teneo, a global advisory firm with close ties to Bill and Hillary Clinton.