Richard Spencer, who was fired as secretary of the Navy for resisting President Donald Trump’s advocacy of a Navy SEAL who was acquitted of murder, said Wednesday that he had personally asked the president to stay out of the case but was rebuffed because the president doesn’t understand the military.

In an op-ed column in The Washington Post, Spencer wrote that from the start, Trump personally involved himself in the case of Chief Petty Officer Eddie Gallagher, who was convicted in July of posing with the corpse of a young Islamic State fighter but was acquitted of having killed the young man.

Gallagher was demoted from chief petty officer to petty officer first class and fined two months’ wages.

Spencer wrote that as early as four months before the trial, Trump called him twice asking that Gallagher not be confined in a Navy brig; eventually, the president ordered him to have Gallagher transferred.

Earlier this month, after Gallagher submitted his request to retire, the Navy began the process to assess which rank he would be allowed to hold at retirement and whether he would be allowed to keep the gold Trident insignia signifying his status as a member of the elite Sea, Air, and Land Teams, or SEALs. Read more

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Richard Spencer, who was fired as secretary of the Navy for resisting President Donald Trump’s advocacy of a Navy SEAL who was acquitted of murder, said Wednesday that he had personally asked the president to stay out of the case but was rebuffed because the president doesn’t understand the military.

Richard Spencer, who was fired as secretary of the Navy for resisting President Donald Trump’s advocacy of a Navy SEAL who was acquitted of murder, said Wednesday that he had personally asked the president to stay out of the case but was rebuffed because the president doesn’t understand the military.