Former President Donald Trump suggested shooting racial justice protesters when the demonstrations neared the White House, former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper writes in a new memoir. “Can’t you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something?” Trump asked the newly appointed Esper in a tense Oval Office meeting on June 1, 2020, the cabinet member wrote. Esper, who was abruptly fired by Trump after Election Day, recalled the “surreal” experience of hearing the commander-in-chief discuss opening fire on American protesters. “(I was) sitting in front of the Resolute desk, inside the …
