A former advertising mogul and cable news talk show host, who is an MSNBC regular contributor, told “Dateline: White House” hostess Nicolle Wallace during Friday’s program that four generals need to come out of retirement to campaign against President Donald J. Trump.

“Here's the campaign that Democrats need to run, and I've been thinking about this a lot,” said Donny Deutsch, who sold the advertising firm he inherited from his father in 2000 before beginning his comme ci, comme ça cable news career.

“There are four people that need to step forward: Kelly, Mattis, McMaster, and Milley,” he said. 

This is the Democratic campaign that would move people. Straight to camera. Black and white. Pure raw honesty and emotion. Four Generals who served under Trump warning the American people about what a next Trump Presidency would look like. pic.twitter.com/LNsFnG7LOd

— Donny Deutsch (@DonnyDeutsch) March 2, 2024

Trump trusted all four men, each of whom betrayed him. 

Retired Marine Gen. John F. Kelly served as Trump’s Homeland Security secretary and White House chief of staff and is the man who told The Atlantic anonymously that Trump would not visit the Belleau Wood battlefield and cemetery in France because he thought dead U.S. soldiers were losers. It was a remark no one else in Trump's entourage--even John Bolton--has ever validated. It was Kelly who engineered the ouster of White House Chief Strategist Stephen K. Bannon just as Bannon was spinning up the White House’s defense against Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III. Of the four men, Kelly is the most hostile to Trump, calling him “the most flawed man I have ever met.”

Retired Marine Gen. James N. Mattis was Trump’s Defense secretary, and while he ran the Pentagon, he often opposed Trump's policies, such as sending troops to the Mexican border and pulling troops out of Syria. The warning signs were there early when Mattis tried to bring to the Pentagon holdover luminaries from President Barack Obama’s administration, such as Michele Flournoy and Anne W. Patterson.

Retired Army Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster was the successor to retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn as Trump’s National Security Advisor. It was McMaster who torpedoed Erik Prince’s plan to extricate U.S. forces from Afghanistan, which included plans for industrial development of the country. During McMaster’s tenure, the White House’s national security staff was turned against the president until McMaster’s hold on the job was no longer tenable. To his credit, he has defended Trump at times, but at other times, like in his tell-all book tour, he labeled Trump’s foreign policy: “strategic narcissism.”

Retired Army Gen. Mark A. Milley was Obama’s Army chief of staff, and despite opposition from Mattis, he convinced Trump to name him chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In the summer of 2020, as the George Floyd riots roiled Washington and cities around the country, Milley broke with Trump and he opposed Trump's use of the Insurrection Act to regain control of the cities. Later in Trump’s term, Milley, who has no legal role in the chain of command, told the Pentagon staff any orders from Trump had to be approved by him. If that was not enough, he called the head of the People's Liberation Army to assure the ChiComs that if Trump ordered an attack on Red China, he would give them the heads-up.

READ MORE: Milley Is the Don Barzini of the Deep State

Deutsch said Democrats need to mobilize these four generals to get out the word that Trump is coming after them and their privileges. 

“There needs to be a “General Campaign,” where these generals who've worked with him need to turn to the American public and turn to the camera and say: ‘You don't understand how scary this can be. We really can go over a cliff here,’” he said.

“Patriots need to start to stand up,” he said. 

“I think if you do the right campaign with those four guys and you continue to put the message out, you're going to lose control of your bodies, women, immigration,” he said. “It will even get worse as it did the first time with Donald Trump.”

The former star of the USA Network sitcom “Donny!” said the country’s system of government is at stake. “Our democracy is really, really, really on the line here, and our way of life will change.”

Deutsch: I am on Trump’s enemies list

Deutsch, who befriended Trump lawyer Michael Cohen and helped convince him to flip on his client, said he is afraid that if Trump returns to office, both he and Cohen will be targeted.

“By the way, I'm afraid I've been one of the most outspoken guys,” he said. “Somebody said to me: ‘Are you afraid if he gets reelected?' And I hadn't thought about it.”

Deutsch told Wallace Trump would go after her and “Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough.

“He’s going to come after Joe. He's going to come after me. He might come after you. I mean, this is what people are not comprehending,” he said.

Bannon dismisses Deutsch as a Mad Man ‘nepo’

“War Room” host Stephen K. Bannon played a clip of Wallace and Deutsch discussing the activation of the four retired generals against Trump on his Friday afternoon program, and he said while Deutsch is a ridiculous man, his place in the establishment is senior and real.

“I want to go back to Donny Deutsch,” Bannon said. “Donny Deutsch is a big mouth, right? He's a madman figure.”

The former chief strategist said Deutsch’s father was one of the real Mad Men portrayed in the TV series. 

“His father, if you remember the show of 'Mad Men,' his dad was one of those guys, I think from the 40s and 50s; started one of the ad agencies after the war with the consumer culture,” he said. “Don inherited that, so he's a nepo, but he's a big mouth and always been kind one of those guys.”

Bannon said Deutsch speaks as a member of the country’s inner circle, so he cannot be ignored.

“He’s one of those guys – you got to know because it's six degrees of separation in Manhattan with a lot of dialed-in people – with Donny, it's probably two degrees of separation,” he said.

If Deutsch says he is afraid, he is speaking for a lot of people who see the poll numbers coming out that show Trump ahead of Biden – and that those numbers have been steady, he said. 

“He’s a big marketing guy and he's on “Morning Joe” all the time, and they're talking about marketing and marketing, how you position narratives, and so he's information warfare light.”