Former Secretary of State Colin Powell called Donald Trump a “national disgrace” in a series of private emails reviewed by BuzzFeed News. Powell also said in an email that Trump “is in the process of destroying himself, no need for Dems to attack him. [Speaker of the House] Paul Ryan is calibrating his position again.” Additionally he called the birther movement, which Trump popularized in 2012, a “racist” movement. He also suggested that right-wing conspiracies about Obama being a “secret Muslim” were silly because, “As I have said before, ‘What if he was?’ Muslims are born as Americans everyday.” Other leaked emails show Powell bashing fellow ex-secretary Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server. “Sad thing... HRC could have killed this two years ago by merely telling everyone honestly what she had done and not tie me into it,” he wrote. “I told her staff three times not to try that gambit. I had to throw a mini tantrum at a Hamptons party to get their attention.” In another email from one year earlier, Powell complained that he lost a speaking gig at a university because Clinton had overcharged them. “Everything HRC touches she kind of screws up with hubris,” he lamented.
