Video News Clips: In Their Own Words

Scott Jennings Dropkicks Democrats Over Video Urging Military To Disobey Trump

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Republican strategist Scott Jennings rebuked Democrats on “2WAY TONIGHT with Mark Halperin” on Tuesday for urging the military and the intelligence community to push back on President Donald Trump’s administration.

Democratic Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin posted a video to X on Tuesday in which she and five of her congressional colleagues — all with prior military or intelligence experience — told service members and intelligence personnel to “refuse illegal orders.” Jennings argued on the show that the Democrats in the video were delusional and mischaracterizing the Trump administration’s actions due to their dislike of the president.

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“What are the illegal orders? What are they talking about? It’s like they live in an alternate reality. They live in a movie. They live in a TV show where something that they claim is happening is not actually happening in reality,” Jennings said. “I don’t know what illegal activity they’re talking about, but I do know what illegal activity they’re recommending. And they’re trying to get people in the chain of command to disobey the commander-in-chief, which would be a terrible—”

Host Mark Halperin interrupted Jennings to note the Democrats specifically said to disobey “illegal orders.”

“What orders?” Jennings asked.

Halperin said he was not sure what the Democrats were referring to, but that he disagreed with Jennings that they were pushing for illegal disobedience.

“Well, I mean, I think they’re trying to influence members of the military to start to determine all orders are illegal orders just because they don’t like Donald Trump,” Jennings retorted. “That’s the way I took it. I mean, what are they trying to do, foment insurrection in the ranks of the military? I mean, what are they doing?”

“They’re saying if you’re being asked to do something illegal, you can come forward,” Halperin replied.

Jennings again pushed for an example.

“I don’t know … I’d like to hear an example, but I don’t understand why people are so upset by this,” Halperin said. “They’re not advocating anything illegal. I’m not trying to fight with you. I’m just truly mystified because I’ve heard from like 20 people about this.”

However, Jennings argued the video fell into a larger pattern of Democrats wanting to delegitimize Trump.

“This goes to the core argument that Democrats have made for ten years about Donald Trump. They’ve never gotten over it. He is the legitimately elected president of the United States,” he said. “He was in 2016. He was in 2024. He is presently the legitimate commander-in-chief. But you have this group of Democrats who have tried to treat him like an illegitimate president every step of the way for the last decade.”

“This is the latest installment in this fantasy that Donald Trump isn’t actually supposed to be able to act as the president or the commander in chief or whatever,” he added.

Besides Slotkin, the Democrats in the video included Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, Pennsylvania Reps. Chris Deluzio and Chrissy Houlahan, New Hampshire Rep. Maggie Goodlander and Colorado Rep. Jason Crow.

“This administration is pitting our uniformed military and intelligence community professionals against American citizens,” Kelly said in tandem with Crow and Slotkin.

“Our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders. You can refuse illegal orders. You must refuse illegal orders,” Kelly, Slotkin and Deluzio said subsequently in the video.

Under Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution, the president serves as commander-in-chief of the nation’s armed forces. The president is also in charge of intelligence agencies like the FBI and CIA as head of the executive branch — a responsibility laid out in Article II, Section 1.