As you assemble to graduate and receive your commissions as U.S. Army officers, consider this day an opportunity to reflect on what you have learned about leadership at West Point and what it means to be a leader of character. While you must stay above partisan politics, take a moment and use the critical thinking skills you have developed to assess whether the conduct, rhetoric and values of your graduation speaker, President Donald J. Trump, live up to the Academy’s motto of “Duty, Honor, Country” and the Army’s high expectations for leaders of American soldiers.
The Naval Academy and virtually every college and university in America reluctantly decided to cancel their spring in-person commencements in light of the Covid-19 risks. The president short-circuited the Military Academy’s assessment of whether an in-person graduation was advisable. Despite the health risks to you, your families, the West Point community, and the traveling public, the president declared he would indeed be your speaker — so he could see you in a “nice, tight formation” — unwilling to pass up the opportunity to link himself with a military he avoided serving in.
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