Trump defends ongoing divisive rhetoric
Day of travel across country features protests, political attacks
EL PASO — Aiming to play the traditional role of healer during national tragedy, President Donald Trump paid visits Wednesday to cities reeling from mass shootings that left 31 dead and dozens wounded. But his divisive words preceded him, large protests greeted him and biting political attacks soon followed.
The president and first lady Melania Trump flew to El Paso late in the day after visiting a Dayton, Ohio, hospital where many of the victims of Sunday’s attack in that city were treated. For most of the day, the president was kept out of view of the reporters traveling with him, but the White House said the couple met with hospital staffers and first responders and spent time with wounded survivors and their families.
Trump told them he was “with them,” press secretary Stephanie Grisham said. “Everybody received him very warmly. Everybody was very, very excited to see him.”
Trump said the same about his reception in the few moments he spoke with the media at a 911 call
center in El Paso.
But outside Dayton’s Miami Valley Hospital, at least 200 protesters gathered, blaming Trump’s incendiary rhetoric for inflaming political and racial tensions in the country and demanding action on gun control. Some said Trump was not welcome in their city. There were Trump supporters, as well.
An attorney for the family of the man charged in the El Paso shooting rampage says the man’s mother contacted police weeks before the rampage out of concern that her son had a rifle.
Dallas attorney Chris Ayres confirmed to The Associated Press that the call was made to police in Allen, a Dallas suburb. He declined to give details, but he and fellow attorney R. Jack Ayres told CNN that Patrick Crusius’ mother contacted the Allen Police Department to ask about an “AK-type” firearm Crusius owned.
The attorneys said the mother was only seeking information and wasn’t motivated by a concern that her son was a threat to anybody. They also said the mother didn’t identify herself or her son in the call.
Sgt. Jon Felty, Allen police spokesman, said there was no record of such a call and he wasn’t aware of such a call.
In El Paso, former Rep. Beto O’Rourke spoke to several hundred people at a separate gathering. O’Rourke, a potential Democratic 2020 presidential rival, has blistered Trump as a racist instigator, but he also told those in his audience the open way the people of his hometown treat one another could be “the example of the United States of America.”
Emotions are still raw in both cities in the aftermath of the weekend shootings. Critics contend Trump’s words have contributed to a combustible climate that has spawned killings and other violence.
The vitriol continued Wednesday.
Trump’s motorcade passed El Paso protesters holding “Racist Go Home” signs. And Trump spent part of his flight between Ohio and Texas airing his grievances on Twitter, berating Democratic lawmakers, O’Rourke and the press. It was a remarkable split-screen appearance for TV viewers, with White House images of handshakes and selfies juxtaposed with angry tweets.
Trump and the White House have forcefully disputed the idea that he bears some responsibility for the nation’s divisions. And he continued to do so Wednesday.
“My critics are political people,” Trump said as he left the White House, noting the apparent political leanings of the shooter in the Dayton killings. He also defended his rhetoric on issues including immigration, claiming that he “brings people together.”
About 85% of U.S. adults believe the tone and nature of political debate have become more negative, with a majority saying Trump has changed things for the worse, according to recent Pew Research Center polling. And 78% say that elected officials who use heated or aggressive language to talk about certain people or groups make violence against those people more likely.
In Dayton, raw anger and pain were on display as protesters chanted “Ban those guns” and “Do something!” during Trump’s visit.
But in El Paso, where more protests awaited, Raul Melendez, whose father-in-law, David Johnson, was killed in Saturday’s shooting, said the most appropriate thing Trump could do was to meet with relatives of the victims.
“It shows that he actually cares, if he talks to individual families,” said Melendez, who credits Johnson with helping his 9-year-old daughter survive the attack by pushing her under a counter. Melendez, an Army veteran and the son of Mexican immigrants, said he holds only the shooter responsible for the attack.
“That person had the intent to hurt people, he already had it,” he said. “No one’s words would have triggered that.”
Local Democratic lawmakers who had expressed concern about the visit said Trump nonetheless hit the right notes Wednesday.
“He was comforting. He did the right things, and Melania did the right things. It’s his job to comfort people,” said U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, who nonetheless said he was “very concerned about a president that divides in his rhetoric and plays to race in his rhetoric.”
“I think the victims and the first responders were grateful that the president of the United States came to Dayton,” said Mayor Nan Whaley, a Democrat, who said she was glad Trump had not stopped at the site of the shooting.
“A lot of the time, his talk can be very divisive, and that’s the last thing we need in Dayton,” she said.
Grisham, responding on Twitter from aboard Air Force One, said it was “genuinely sad” to see lawmakers “immediately hold such a dishonest press conference in the name of partisan politics.”
Despite protests in both cities, the White House insisted Trump had received positive receptions. One aide tweeted that Trump was a “rock star” at the Dayton hospital.
The White House did not allow reporters and photographers to watch as he talked with wounded victims, medical staff and law enforcement officers there, but then quickly published its own photos on social media and released a video of his visit.
Although he has been able to summon soothing words and connect one-on-one with victims, he often quickly lapses into divisive tweets and statements — just recently painting immigrants as “invaders,” suggesting four Democratic congresswoman of color should “go back” to their home countries even though they’re U.S. citizens and deriding majority-black Baltimore as a rat-infested hellhole.
On the eve of his trip, Trump lashed out at O’Rourke, who had tweeted that Trump “helped create the hatred that made Saturday’s tragedy possible” and “should not come to El Paso.”
O’Rourke “should respect the victims & law enforcement — & be quiet!” Trump snapped back.
And on his flight between one scene of tragedy and the second, Trump said he tuned in as another 2020 rival, former Vice President Joe Biden, excoriated him in a speech that slammed him as incapable of offering the moral leadership that has defined the presidency for generations and “fueling a literal carnage” in America.
Trump declared the speech “Sooo Boring!” and said, “The LameStream Media will die in the ratings and clicks” if Biden wins.