Sean Spicer tells Glenn Beck how Biden unwittingly helped Trump fire 'anyone he wants'

President Donald Trump cleaned house last week at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in the nation's capital. Trump fired all 18 board members who were appointed by Democratic presidents, then appointed MAGA allies, who ultimately made him their chairman.

Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer told Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck on Tuesday that the turfing of Biden loyalists at the Kennedy Center and other appointees throughout the government was made possible by a strategic blunder on the part of the previous administration.

Spicer indicated that after he exited the role of White House press secretary in July 2017, Trump appointed him to the U.S. Naval Academy board of visitors for a three-year term, which would expire on Dec. 30, 2021.

Although Spicer had time left in his term, he received an email on Sept. 8, 2021, from the Biden White House demanding that he resign by 6 p.m. that day. The letter indicated that should he fail to comply, his "position with the Board will be terminated."

Spicer indicated that he didn't resign and was fired.

Recalling his reaction, Spicer told Beck, "I was like, 'You couldn't just wait 60 days just to have it for free?'"

"So it turns out he fired everybody," said Spicer. "Myself, from the Naval Academy board. Russ Vought from the Naval Academy board. And then a guy named [Ret. Gen. H.R.] McMaster from the West Point board."

Spicer told Beck he was approached shortly thereafter by White House adviser Stephen Miller and his legal outfit, America First Legal, who proposed suing Biden to force him to "argue that he has the absolute authority to fire anybody."

The complaint they ultimately filed stated that Biden "has no authority to terminate Mr. Spicer's and Mr. Vought's appointments to the Board" and lacked the "constitutional authority under Article II to terminate Mr. Spicer's and Mr. Vought's appointments to the Board because it is a purely advisory nonpartisan entity that does not wield any executive power."

U.S. District Court Judge Dabney Friedrich ruled in 2022 that neither Spicer nor Vought were insulated from removal, suggesting that doing so "would raise serious constitutional issues, as Board members are executive officials whose 'only role ... is to advise the President on the performance of a quintessentially executive function.'"

'Joe Biden was so petty.'

Spicer and Vought appealed Friedrich's decision but dropped their appeal after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled in a separate case regarding another Trump appointee's removal from the board of a federal agency that as a general rule, the president "may freely remove his subordinates."

Spicer told Beck that in the wake of his apparent legal defeat, "the media started calling, Glenn, and said, 'You lost the case.' And I said at the time, 'Did I?'"

Poetic justice would have it that Biden's supposed victories in court paved the way for Trump to remove Katherine Petrelius — the woman who emailed Spicer in September 2021, telling him to resign — and other Democratic appointees from the Kennedy Center board earlier this month.

A spokesman for the center told the Washington Post that the organization didn't fight Trump's takeover on account of the precedent set in Spicer's case.

"Never in the history of the United States has any president ever removed somebody from a service academy board prior to their term being done for anything less than malfeasance. And even that, we can't find an example. Never!" Spicer told Beck. "Joe Biden was so petty."

Upon learning that Biden's pettiness "has given President Trump the authority to fire anyone he wants," Spicer said he was "ecstatic."

"I think it's absolutely fantastic," said Beck. "I thank you for what you did. And, you know, the only thing that would make it better is if you or I were on the board of the Kennedy Center and we could announce that Lee Greenwood's residency was taking place at the Kennedy Center."

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