(PatriotWise.com)- Peter Navarro, a former trade adviser to President Trump, encouraged him not to give the keynote address at the America First Policy Institute (AFPI), denouncing the organization’s personnel and asserting they were plotting a “‘Trumpism without Trump’ coup.”
Tuesday’s AFPI meeting will feature statements from Trump, who will be visiting Washington for the first time in almost 18 months amid rumors that he could seek reelection in 2024.
Navarro advised Trump to postpone the address despite the former President’s need to assemble a team of policy experts.
According to Navarro, President Trump must have a stable of certified policy experts who can construct a 2024 platform and identify strong MAGA talent to fill a future Trump Administration. But the AFPI, who he believes is a Trojan Horse—whose leadership is currently boasting about how it will fill Trump’s “shadow cabinet”—is categorically not the place to garner recruits.
Former Energy Secretary Rick Perry, former National Security Council director of staff Fred Fleitz, and former economic advisor Larry Kudlow were among the AFPI members who Navarro attacked.
Navarro wrote an op-ed, Taking Back Trump’s America, where he explains how he had to contend with Brother Larry (Kudlow) practically every day, not just in regards to trade policy but also in his attempts to push Trump’s two most basic directives: purchase American, hire American. And Kudlow collaborated closely with many of Trump’s Council of Economic Advisors (CEA) members. According to his op-ed, they now make up the free trade core of AFPI’s economic specialists.
Along with labeling people connected to the AFPI as “grifters,” Navarro suggested that their “broader ambition” may be to hijack the political attraction of Trumpism but replace Trump with an AFPI-anointed RINO [Republican in name only].
In a letter to The Hill, Marc Lotter, the AFPI’s top communications officer, attacked Navarro and brought up his prior endorsement of Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential candidate.
It is disheartening to watch erstwhile Hillary Clinton supporter Mr. Navarro becoming the DC swamp monster he once despised. Nearly 20 top White House officials from Trump’s White House and nine former cabinet-level officials head AFPI, according to Lotter.
Regarding the other remarks, the AFPI is now hosting a two-day summit to provide a comprehensive policy agenda for the future. The fact that President Trump is concluding this gathering demonstrates his support for the work of AFPI to maintain the policies that put America First, he said.
