Former Department of Homeland Security official Miles Taylor revealed himself on Wednesday to be “Anonymous,” the author of a book and op-ed critical of President Trump.
“It’s time for everyone to step out of the shadows,” said Mr. Taylor, formerly chief of staff at DHS under Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.
“Issuing my critiques without attribution forced the president to answer them directly on their merits or not at all, rather than creating distractions through petty insults and name-calling,” he said in a statement. “I wanted the attention to be on the arguments themselves.”
After his op-ed in The New York Times was published in 2018, Mr. Trump criticized it as “gutless,” tweeting, “TREASON?”
“If the GUTLESS anonymous person does indeed exist,” Mr. Trump tweeted that day, “the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once!”
Speaking at a rally in Goodyear, Arizona, on Wednesday, Mr. Trump dismissed Mr. Taylor as “a nobody, a disgruntled employee” as well as a “sleazebag.”
Mr. Taylor was named in a DHS whistleblower complaint this year as one of the people allegedly shaping U.S. intelligence and retaliating against people who didn’t comply. He also was involved in drafting Mr. Trump’s travel ban.
Mr. Taylor said he wrote nameless criticisms of the president because “Donald Trump is a man without character.”
“Trump sees personal criticism as subversive,” Mr. Taylor said. “I take a different view. We do not owe the president our silence. We owe him and the American people the truth.”
The Trump campaign noted that Mr. Taylor denied to CNN’s Anderson Cooper twice on Aug. 21 that he was “Anonymous.” Mr. Taylor is now a CNN contributor.
He is a lifelong Republican. Mr. Taylor served as a political appointee in the George W. Bush administration.
Mr. Taylor came into the Trump administration with DHS Secretary John F. Kelly.
“Too often in times of crisis, I saw Donald Trump prove he is a man without character, and his personal defects have resulted in leadership failures so significant that they can be measured in lost American lives,” he said. “I witnessed Trump’s inability to do his job over the course of two-and-a-half years. Everyone saw it, though most were hesitant to speak up for fear of reprisals.”
Chad Wolf, the acting secretary at Homeland Security and a former chief of staff there, said Mr. Miles’ claims of having attempted to undermine the president from within rang hollow.
He said worked alongside Mr. Miles and “he never vocalized disagreement with the president’s policies – and in fact expressed strong support.”
“This charade is another sad reminder that not all who pursue public service are doing so for the public good,” Mr. Wolf said.
Trump campaign press secretary Hogan Gidley called Mr. Taylor’s disclosure “the least impressive, lamest political ’reveal’ of all time.”
“I worked with DHS officials while I was in the White House, and even I had to research who Miles Taylor was,” Mr. Gidley said. “He’s just another standard-issue arrogant, Washington, D.C., swamp bro who loved President Trump until he figured out he could try to make money by attacking him.”
Mr. Gidley called out Mr. Taylor for lying on CNN about his actions, “proving that all he ever wanted to do was try and extend his fleeting 15 minutes of fame and squeeze a few more book sales out of the deal.”
“By contrast, U.S. Navy veteran Tony Bobulinksi is not anonymous and is publicly pointing the finger at a real corrupt politician, Joe Biden, who schemed with his family to make millions from foreign business investors,” Mr. Gidley said. “The very fact that the Beltway media cared about and hyped up ’Anonymous’ just emphasizes how derelict they are when they totally ignore the readily visible Biden pay-to-play scandal unfolding before their eyes.”
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said Mr. Taylor’s identity didn’t reflect well on The New York Times’ decision to grant him anonymity to write an op-ed.
“You have got to be kidding me. Miles Taylor?” Mr. Meadows tweeted. “That’s who the New York Times granted an anonymous editorial article? I’ve seen more exciting reveals in Scooby-Doo episodes. What a monumental embarrassment.”
Mr. Meadows said the episode is “laughable” but also damaging to the media.
“The New York Times amplified a no-name agency deputy with no access to President Trump and misled Americans into thinking he was an influential senior official. Absolutely ridiculous,” he said.
In his Times column, Mr. Taylor wrote anonymously that he was part of a secret “resistance” determined to blunt Mr. Trump’s “misguided impulses” and undermine parts of his agenda.
“Many Trump appointees have vowed to do what we can to preserve our democratic institutions while thwarting Mr. Trump’s more misguided impulses until he is out of office,” he wrote at the time.
He later wrote an anti-Trump book, “A Warning,” also written anonymously. The author called Mr. Trump incompetent and unfit to be commander in chief.
He said Mr. Trump “stumbles, slurs, gets confused, is easily irritated, and has trouble synthesizing information.”
• Stephen Dinan contributed to this report.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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