Democrats and media pundits have linked former President Trump’s rhetoric to the second assassination attempt against him in the past few months and have called on Trump to tone down his outburst.
“It really seems to be a confluence of two very bad things that are going on in the Republican Party,” Representative Mikie Sherrill, Speaking to CNN’s Jim Acosta on Monday, D-N.J., accused the GOP of trying to “divide the public” and “enrage” them through “false rumors and misinformation.”
The former president has accused An assassination attempt on the rhetoric coming from Democrats, particularly President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
CNN commentator Ana Navarro argued Tuesday that Trump “failed to be a huge part of the problem and then pretends it’s only caused by people on the other side.”
Democrats and members of the media are linking Donald Trump’s own rhetoric to the second assassination attempt against him on Sunday. (Left: Photo: Nathan Congleton/NBC via Getty Images, Center: Hannah Baer/Bloomberg via Getty Images, Right: Screenshot/CNN, Right: Screenshot/ABC) (Fox News)
“Until you decide to watch what’s coming out of your mouth, stop blaming people,” “The View” co-host Whoopi Goldberg said Tuesday. She also argued that Republicans are the only ones contributing to the violent rhetoric.
“Let’s stop talking about both sides because it’s not right. It’s not talking about both sides. It’s one clear side, and you can point to many, many reports, you can point to all kinds of things that have been reported, you guys have to back that up. It’s not us or them. It’s you have to stop doing what you’re doing, JD, and what you’re doing, Mr. T (Trump), because you’re not helping the situation,” Goldberg said.
“You have a former president who has twice been the target of assassination, but he’s also been an instigator of political violence,” The New York Times’ Zolan Kanno-Youngs said Tuesday with CNN’s Dana Bash.
Lester Holt of NBC NewsJust hours after the assassination attempt, the US Senate said the attack on Trump followed “strong rhetoric” from the former president and his running mate J.D. Vance.
“Today’s assassination attempt comes amid increasingly strident rhetoric during the campaign. Mr. Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance continue to make unfounded claims about Haitian immigrants in Ohio. This weekend, there were new bomb threats in that city,” Holt said.
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event at the Linda Ronstadt Music Hall in Tucson, Arizona, on Thursday. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
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Trump and Vance been pushed repeatedly Inflammatory claims about Haitian immigrants were not deemed credible by officials in Springfield, Ohio. Hoax bomb threats from abroad also affected Springfield, according to Republican Ohio Governor Mike DeWine.
MSNBC’s Alex Witt wondered Sunday if the Trump campaign might make any calls to ease tensions following this effort.
“Do you expect there will be a call from within the Trump campaign to do that? Because he will reach out to his supporters and say let’s take this down,” he said. “We don’t know the source of any of the shootings or the shootings. We don’t know who’s responsible for this. The whole thing still has to be 100 percent confirmed from start to finish, how this all happened. But do you expect to hear anything from the Trump campaign about toning down the rhetoric, toning down the violence, or would that be unusual for a former president?”
Peter Baker of The New York Times Trump and Vance’s claims about Springfield were also linked to the assassination attempt.
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference held at Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, on Friday, September 13. (AP/JC Hong)
“And so it will be in 2024,” Baker wrote. “In less than a week, the onetime and possibly future commander-in-chief has become both the inspiration and the obvious target for the political violence that has shaped American politics in the modern era.”
“At the center of today’s political violence is Mr. Trump, a man who inspires people to make threats or take action both for and against him,” Baker said. “He has long espoused the language of violence in his political discourse, encouraging supporters to beat up rioters, threatening to shoot looters and illegal immigrants, joking about a near-fatal assault on the Democratic House Speaker’s husband and suggesting that a general he views as disloyal should be assassinated.”
Baker also attended On Tuesday, MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell discussed Trump’s past rhetoric; the former president has been criticized for statements such as making light of a 2022 attack on Paula Pelosi.
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a campaign rally at Bojangles Coliseum on Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024, in Charlotte, NC. (AP Photo/Jacqueline Martin)
“With two assassination attempts on the former president in two months, we’re seeing that we’re in a different kind of era, right? It’s not that there hasn’t been political violence, there has been, but to see two assassination attempts in such a short period of time, obviously that’s different.”
Baker said Trump is not only “an instigator of political violence but also a likely target of it.”
Returning to the network as a guest after being fired last year, Former CNN host Don Lemon said This week he said that if Trump changed his behavior, he would not have to face harsh comments.
“If Donald Trump wants people, Kamala Harris and others to stop saying he’s a threat to democracy, then he should stop threatening democracy,” Lemon said.
Others took aim at Trump’s complaints about Democratic rhetoric following the assassination attempt, including CNN’s David Chalian, who argued that Trump was not a “credible messenger” in terms of curbing rhetoric about political violence.
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Bulwark’s Sarah Longwell declared on CNN that Trump “created this specter of political violence that we’re all living under now,” adding that it’s “his rhetoric that’s been creating this environment for the last eight years.”
Fox News Digital contacted the Trump campaign for comment.
