Politics

I know Mark Milley. We should take his Trump warning seriously.

Published

2 years ago

November 11, 2024

Blue Light Newsroom

I know Mark Milley. We should take his Trump warning seriously.

Oct. 15, 2024, 5:56 PM UTC

By Max Rose

This is an adapted excerpt from the Oct. 14 episode of “The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle.”

As we inch closer to the election, former Donald Trump appointees are sounding the alarm over the prospect of the Republican nominee’s return to the White House. According to a forthcoming book from veteran journalist Bob Woodwardretired U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley called Trump “fascist to the core” and “the most dangerous person to this country.”

This man saw Trump up close and personal and after that experience, he has said resoundingly that Trump should go nowhere near the Oval Office again.

These comments from Milley, Trump’s former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffare absolutely stunning, and as someone who knows him personally, I can tell you that the last thing in the world this man wants to be is political. Milley has dedicated his entire life to military service and the apolitical pursuit of serving the commander in chief — irrespective of his or her political affiliation.

For him to take this step, in perhaps the most public manner imaginable, shows the gravity of the threat that Trump poses.

As the senior military adviser to the president, Milley served alongside Trump day in and day out. This man saw the former president up close and personal and after that experience, he has said resoundingly that Trump should go nowhere near the Oval Office again. We should take his message incredibly seriously.

Milley’s warning came to light just days before Trump once again threatened to use his presidential power to go after political enemies. In an interview that aired Sunday on Fox NewsTrump said he would deploy the military on American soil to handle what he called “the enemy from within” on Election Day.

Should Trump win a second term, what we would be relying on to prevent the former president from taking these extraordinary steps is not just the rule of law but also the character of our men and women in uniform. These brave men and women swear an oath, not to an individual but to a document and a set of principles: the Constitution. I’ve taken this oath multiple times and sworn to protect this nation against enemies, both foreign as well as domestic.

What Trump and his associates are seeking to do is not just weaponize the military but replace these brave men and women of character with loyalists and yes-men. That possibility is why Milley called Trump “the most dangerous person to this country.” That is the gravity of this election and that is what’s on the line in November.

Max Rose

Max Rose represented New York’s 11th Congressional District as a Democrat in the House from 2018 to 2021. He’s currently a Senior Advisor to “Vote Vets.”

Allison Detzel

contributed

Politics

World Cup fuels ticketing reform demands

Published

3 hours ago

June 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Demands are growing for a political reckoning over ticket scams at the World Cup — and beyond.

The National Independent Venue Association and Fan Alliance, organizations representing and advocating for entertainment venues and artists respectively, sent a joint letter to Congress on Thursday, calling on lawmakers to ban speculative and ghost tickets, cases where resellers flog tickets they don’t actually have.

The letter — addressed to Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer — includes nearly two dozen accounts of fans who say they were scammed out of thousands of dollars trying to get tickets to the World Cup, which began last week. The groups are also asking fans to share their own stories with elected officials via the Fix the Tix Fan Action Center that launched last week.

“Every one of these stories erodes the public’s faith that consumers should and will be protected from fraud,” NIVA Executive Director Stephen Parker and Fan Alliance founder Donald Cohen wrote. “We urge Congress to work with us to prevent fraud like this in the future and finally enact ticket resale consumer protections that will protect Americans and ensure affordability.”

The letter flagged fans like Dacy Gillespie, who bought World Cup tickets for her sons on Christmas, only to learn on match day — months later — that the seller couldn’t deliver them. And Skylie Shore, who Parker and Cohen said spent well over $6,000 on tickets to the Scotland-Haiti match on June 13, but was forced to wait outside the stadium because she couldn’t access them as fans marched in on gameday.

“These examples reveal a consistent pattern: consumer deception, speculative ticket sales, and broken-hearted American families at the hands of resale ticketing companies like StubHub,” Parker and Cohen wrote.

In a statement, StubHub spokesperson Jack Sterne said that the platform does not allow speculative ticket sales, and blamed FIFA for users’ difficulty in accessing their tickets.

“We understand that attending the World Cup represents a significant investment in time and money, and we take our responsibility to every fan who books through our platform seriously,” Sterne said in a statement. “Many of the issues fans are facing trace back to the event organizer’s technology infrastructure, newly announced transfer restrictions, and a new app that was launched just a month ago.”

In response, FIFA said in a statement that the organization “can guarantee the validity and delivery of tickets purchased through its official platforms” and that FIFA.com/tickets “is the official ticket sales channel” for the tournament.

NIVA and Fan Alliance are urging congressional leadership to place universal price-gouging limits on ticket resale, enact stringent fines on perpetrators and a violation-reporting mechanism for ticket scams, and require secondary ticketing platforms to produce data on ticket fulfillment and consumer complaints.

The groups are not the only ones monitoring for evidence of shady ticket practices. Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway issued a consumer guidance in advance of the tournament, urging match-goers to beware of fraud and promising to hold offenders accountable. And the FBI in May put out a public service announcement, warning fans against purchasing tickets on copycat websites modeled on FIFA’s.

“With the World Cup coming to Kansas City, excitement is high and, unfortunately, so is the potential for fraud,” Hanaway said in her statement. “Missourians should be able to enjoy this once-in-a-generation event without fear of being deceived. My office will hold accountable anyone who seeks to exploit our families, and we stand ready to assist anyone who encounters suspicious activity.”