President Donald Trump is largely avoiding discussion of the threats of post-election violence made by left-wing groups, but when pressed on the issue, he says any such mayhem will be quickly quashed.
“We want to win, and once we win, we’ll take care of business,” Trump said in an interview with podcast host Dan Bongino, posted on Monday. “We’ll take care of business.”
Bongino, a former Secret Service agent, noted that groups such as the Transition Integrity Project – which has ties to billionaire activism donor George Soros – have pledged a “street fight” if Trump tries to claim victory in the November 3 election.
The interview with Trump was recorded on Friday, just before Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died. The prospect of Trump filling another seat on the court added more vitriol to the nation’s already toxic political divide.
Former CNN host Reza Aslan was among the leftists who threatened violence if a Trump nominee is confirmed by the Senate this year, saying, “Over our dead bodies. Literally,” and adding, “If they even try to replace RBG, we will burn the entire f***ing thing down.”
And he wasn’t the only one. Beau Willimon, producer of Netflix’s ‘House of Cards’, said Democrats are “shutting this country down” if Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell try to ram through a Ginsburg replacement.
Democrat lawmakers, such as Sen. Kamala Harris (D-California), Rep. Maxine Waters (D-California) and Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Massachusetts), have repeatedly called for violence during Trump’s presidency. Pressley said last month that “there needs to be unrest in the streets for as long as there’s unrest in our lives.”
Trump has blamed politicians in Democrat-run cities for enabling the violent Black Lives Matter and Antifa protests that have occurred across the country since May, when George Floyd died in Minneapolis police custody. The Department of Justice said on Monday that New York, Seattle, and Portland have been branded “anarchist jurisdictions” and therefore won’t receive federal law enforcement funding because they have refused to “undertake reasonable measures” to counteract crime.
“The greatest would be Portland,” he said. “I could stop that in a half-hour. That’s easy. They’re anarchists. They’re spoiled kids for the most part. They live in the basement of their mother’s home.” He added that such “agitators” would like to see an overthrow of the government, but “that’s not going to happen. The country has great spirit.”
Bongino also pressed Trump on what would happen if Twitter and other social media companies tried to block him from getting his messages out in the aftermath of a contested election. “I would take it right to the Supreme Court,” the president said, adding that his administration would do everything possible to strip social media platforms of their Section 230 liability protections.
“The funny thing is, I protect them more than the Democrats,” he said. “I actually protect them, because I want to see great companies – I don’t want to see China take over. I think [even] the Democrats would want to repeal Section 230.” He predicted that social media giants would go out of business, were they to lose their Communications Decency Act liability shield.
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