President Trump’s nominee for the Pentagon’s top policy job apologized in a letter to the Senate on Friday for inflammatory tweets made two years ago in which he made derogatory remarks about Islam, President Barack Obama, and other leading Democrats.
Democrats had already expressed concern about Gen. Anthony Tata, a frequent guest on Fox News, and several retired military figures withdrew their support when details of his tweets emerged.
In posts dating from 2018, Tata claimed Obama was a “terrorist leader” who did more to “help Islamic countries than any president in history” and described Islam as the “most oppressive violent religion I know of.”
In a letter addressed to the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, obtained by the Washington Examiner, Tata said he “deeply regretted” the comments.
“Out of the 8,800 tweets I authored and hundreds of speeches I have given, the few misstatements on Twitter, while grievous, are not indicative of who I am,” he wrote. “They are an aberration in a four-decade thread of faithful public service.”
Tata currently holds a senior advisory role to Defense Secretary Mark Esper and was formally nominated on June 10 for the role of under secretary of defense for policy — the third most senior role at the Pentagon.
He is a retired one-star Army general with a resume that includes combat experience and public service, including time as North Carolina secretary of transportation. Those credentials won him an endorsement letter signed by more than 30 former senior military officers, State Department officials, and national security figures.
“While we may differ in outlook and on matters of policy or law on which we focus, we write today with one voice, in united support of the nomination of Brigadier General Anthony J. Tata (U.S. Army, Retired) as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy,” it read.
However, that support began to unravel when CNN unearthed his Twitter activity two days after his nomination.
In 2018, he had lashed out at the media and prominent Democrats, including California Congresswomen Maxine Waters and Nancy Pelosi. Waters, he said, was a “vicious race baiting racist.”
And he used a hashtag to suggest that CNN anchor Don Lemon was on “the liberal plantation.”
Tata said his letter to the committee was not motivated by the nomination but by a sense of letting down personnel whom he had served alongside.
“I deeply regret comments that I made on social media several years ago,” he said. “My tweets were completely out of character, something many of my former colleagues and friends know. I understand that it was unprofessional to have discussed our former commander in chief in the fashion I did.”
He admitted there was no excuse for his “hyperbolic conversations” but said a career spent in Bosnia, Macedonia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan helping Muslims find safe haven showed how he valued people of other faiths.
White House officials urged the Senate to press ahead with nomination hearings.
“Anthony Tata, the president’s exceptionally qualified nominee for Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, is a distinguished public servant whose career has provided him with planning, policy, and operational experience both at home and abroad,” said White House spokesman Judd Deere. “His education, background, and record has earned him bi-partisan praise, and the Senate should not delay his confirmation.”
