LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): After resisting Trump's calls for the National Guard last summer, the left is now fine with militarizing every aspect of the people's house. Fox News reporting that officials will increase the numbers of National Guard members who will be deployed in Washington during the presidential inauguration from 15,000 to 20,000 on Wednesday, about three times the number of U.S. troops currently deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan combined. So, is this all necessary? What's going on?
Joining me now, retired Brigadier General Robert Spalding, former National Security Council official, Hudson Institution Senior Fellow. General, I saw this and I keep hearing from people are driving, trying to drive to their offices on -- near Capitol Hill and they said they've never see anything like it, not at any inauguration, not at any time in our nation's capital except 9/11. Is this necessary?
ROBERT SPALDING (GUEST): You know, it's absolutely -- I think it's a travesty. It's politicizing the military more than any I've ever seen. I know there's been a lot of discussion about the president politicizing the military but when you have a capital filled with 20,000 troops in anticipation, I'm not sure what they are anticipating. You know, the hordes coming across the Potomac River, I'm not sure why this is necessary. I think for the most part it's done for show and that's the great travesty here of this episode.