Rhetoric, violence stir public debate
Allies of President Donald Trump rejected any link between harsh political rhetoric and a rise in violence in the U.S., even as former President Barack Obama’s homeland security chief said changing the “toxic” political environment must start at the top.
The comments came after last week’s pipe bombs mailed to high-profile Democrats and to CNN, and the murder of 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue on Saturday.
Jeh Johnson, the former secretary of homeland security, said “deranged” individuals infused with uncivil political discourse think it’s their place to bring about change in society with assault weapons or bombs.
“Our president has the largest microphone, he has the largest bullhorn,” Johnson said on ABC’s This Week on Sunday. “This particular president has a particularly large voice and a large microphone, and Americans should demand that their leaders insist on change, a more civil discourse and a more civil environment generally.”
Asked on Fox News Sunday whether Trump bears any responsibility for the recent incidents, Kirstjen Nielsen, the current secretary of Homeland Security, said the president “has made it extraordinarily clear that we will never allow political violence to take root in this country.”
Vice President Mike Pence also rejected the notion that confrontational rhetoric by Trump, himself and other Republican leaders has created a spike in political violence.
“People on both sides of the aisle use strong language about our political differences, but I just don’t think you can connect it to threats or acts of violence,” Pence told NBC News in an interview on Saturday.
But Matthew Dowd, a Republican consultant who was chief strategist for former President George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign, said the president needs to do more.
Trump is “not responsible” for recent violent acts by white supremacists, but he has “an obligation to try to rid us of much of this tribalism” and “he has not spoken in the right way in the course of this that it has diminished the hate,” Dowd said on ABC.
Former Trump White House aide Anthony Scaramucci said there are problems on both sides of the political aisle, but as the leader of the free world, Trump needs to “tone it down.”
“He’s the president of the United States,” Scaramucci said on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday. “He controls the news cycle and the bully pulpit. And he could do it.”
Asked whether Trump’s raucous political rallies sow division in the country, Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan said “sometimes.”
“I worry about tribal identity politics becoming the new norm of how politics is waged,” Ryan said in a pre-recorded interview that aired on CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday. He called instead for a return to “inclusive, aspirational politics,” and asked whether Trump practices those politics, said, “Sometimes he does and sometimes he doesn’t.”
Trump condemned “all forms of evil,” including anti-Semitism, in several rounds of comments on Saturday.
“We mourn for the unthinkable loss of life that took place today,” the president told a gathering of young farmers in Indianapolis, pledging the full resources of his administration to investigate the crime. “Our nation and the world are shocked.”
But on Sunday, Trump was mocking political opponents on Twitter. He said liberal billionaire Tom Steyer, who’s waged a petition drive to impeach the president, is “wacky” and came off as a “crazed & stumbling lunatic” in a televised interview.
“It is unthinkable that in the midst of the horrible political violence our president would resort to name-calling instead of repairing the damage to the fabric of our country,” Steyer said in a tweet in response.
Steyer was among the Democrats who received crude pipe bombs in the mail last week. Information for this article was contributed by Ben Brody of Bloomberg News.