Former CIA and NSA Director Michael Hayden criticized President Trump for his insults toward Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, saying the president made himself look “unstable, erratic and thin-skinned.”
“One of their arguments was that the president can’t show weakness and what Trudeau did required this robust response, otherwise the president would appear to be weak as he flew to Singapore,” Hayden told CNN. “Actually, Trudeau did not make President Trump look weak. President Trump made President Trump look unstable, erratic, and thin-skinned.”
Trump and Trudeau exchanged words over the weekend following the G-7 summit in Quebec.
After the president departed the gathering, Trudeau held a press conference threatening retaliatory tariffs against the U.S. in response to the “unjustly” tariffs imposed on Canada by the Trump administration. Trudeau said Canadians “will not be pushed around.”
In response to Trudeau’s remarks, Trump tweeted from Air Force One that the Canadian prime minister acted “meek and mild” during G-7 meetings. He also called Trudeau “very dishonest and weak.”
Trump’s derogatory comments about Trudeau were echoed by top White House officials.
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow told CNN that Trudeau “stabbed us in the back” and “double-crossed” the U.S. after the summit.
White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, meanwhile, told “Fox News Sunday” that “there’s a special place in hell for any foreign leader who engages in bad-faith diplomacy” with Trump.
On Monday, Hayden said the comments from White House officials regarding Trump’s spat with Trudeau drew a “mixture of sadness and frankly, anger.”
[Related: Angela Merkel: Trump’s G-7 tear ‘sobering and a bit depressing’]
“No country deserves to be treated that way, certainly having officials in one government criticize the head of government in another country,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before, and for God’s sake, doing it against Canada after the prime minister issued a fairly mild statement about the Canadians just standing their ground.”
