Documentary filmaker and left-wing activist Michael Moore says transgender military members affected by President Donald Trump’s new policy barring them from service should simply “refuse to leave.”
In an appearance Wednesday on The Late Show, Moore and host Stephen Colbert discussed President Trump’s announcement that transgender people will no longer be allowed to serve in the U.S. military.
“He announced it today just by fiat,” Colbert said. “Didn’t talk to anybody, didn’t tell anybody. No lawyers, didn’t talk to the military, just got up this morning and said, ‘You know, let’s get those folks,’ and just tweeted it and there’s no implication of what it means. No one knows. Nobody’s answered any questions.”
Not mincing his words, Moore called the move “disgusting” and said transgender solider are among America’s bravest military members.
“What is so disgusting about this is, if you are transgender trying to get by in this society, I couldn’t think of any more brave people to have defending this country than transgenders,” Moore said.
Asked what transgender servicemen and women should do in response to Trump’s new policy, Moore said they should “refuse to leave.”
“Just say, ‘We’re not going anywhere. Come get us,'” Moore explained. “What we have is a commander in chief who is trans-Siberian. That’s maybe the bigger problem.”
Moore was on the CBS show to promote his new original one-man Trump-skewering Broadway play, The Terms of My Surrender, which the 63-year-old director says is a humorous take on a “country that’s just elected a madman.”
Going forward, however, Moore says an “army of citizens” must rise up to take down President Trump.
“I will say this: I refuse to live in a country where Donald Trump is president and I’m not leaving. So something’s got to change,” Moore told Colbert. “We have to form an army of citizens and come at him like a swarm of bees.”
“And, frankly, I suggested a few months ago that we have an army of satire, because I think the way to bring him down is with satire. His thin skin, as you pointed out so well, is so thin, all we need is 1,000 or a million little comedy shivs—nonviolent, don’t hurt him—but just under his skin because he can’t take being laughed at.”
Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson
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