Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly offered his resignation earlier Tuesday. It was accepted Tuesday afternoon, just one day after he flew to Guam to tell sailors aboard a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier the captain he had firing for trying to protect them was “stupid.”
Secretary of Defense Mark Esper in a letter (below) announced he had accepted Modly’s resignation, saying that the Navy can now “move on.”
Modly on Monday told thousands of sailors aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt their former CO, Capt. Brett Crozier, was either “too stupid” or “too naive” to helm the ship because the letter he sent to his superiors urging help for the 100 or more sailors who had contracted coronavirus was leaked to the press.
The number of sailors testing positive for coronavirus has skyrocketed to 173 or more, and Crozier on Sunday was diagnosed with COVID-19 as well.
Modly told them Crozier embarassed the Navy and them by sending a letter he should have known would leak.
A transcript and audio recording of Modly’s disastrous speech were immediately leaked to the press. In the audio, one sailor can be heard responding to calling Crozier “stupid” with an astonished expletive.
The editor in chief of Task & Purpose posted Esper’s letter:
Modly effectively was President Donald Trump’s fourth Navy Secretary. This was his second tour as Acting Navy Secretary under this president.