Maine governor thought Trump was having a 'nervous breakdown' during a call on which he complained about George Floyd protests: book

Millions of Americans took to the streets in May 2020 to protest the manner in which George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis police custody.

In a phone call with governors, Trump stressed that they needed to show force against the activism that was becoming a part of the national conversation, according to a forthcoming book.

Martin and Burns wrote in the book "This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America's Future" that one of the governors remarked during a June 2020 conversation that the then-president was a racist.

If the murder of George Floyd spurred Biden into a slightly more active mode of campaigning, it seemed to cause something else entirely in Trump. He wanted to be in charge and he wanted the public to know that.

In the June call with the governors, Trump was joined by Bill Barr and Mark Esper. Martin and Burns wrote that it was clear to the leaders that they would be attending a meeting unlike any other.

Trump demanded a swift return to public order while he wasavaging the racial-justice protestors around the country as terrorists. In the Rose Garden later that day, Trump threatened to deploy federal troops if the governors did not move quickly.

The executives were in shock. Kate Brown, the Democratic governor of Oregon, called out her husband in a nearby room at the governor's residence in Salem.

According to Martin and Burns, she said: "You can't make this shit up." You can't believe that this is happening in the United States of America.

Janet Mills of Maine, who is currently in her first term, was sitting in her office at the State Capitol in Augusta during the call and was taken aback by the tone of the conversation.

Mills called her security guard to listen to the president.

She said at the time that the president of the United States was having a nervous breakdown.

Later that day, Trump, Gen. Mark Milley, and several other advisors walked from the White House complex to St. John's Episcopal Church.

The photo op in which the president held a bible in front of the church was criticized immediately. The inspector general for the Interior Department determined in June of 2021 that the US Park Police and Secret Service did not clear the park for a Trump photoshoot, but to install anti-scale fencing.