President Joe Biden sparked anger on Tuesday night by suggesting that Donald Trump should be in prison just fourteen days after the presidential election.
“We need to lock him up,” the 81-year-old president said at an event in New Hampshire.
Biden seemed to realize what he said and tried to correct himself, saying, “we need to lock him down politically.” Shut him out. That’s what we have to do.’
It comes after Democratic vice president nominee Kamala Harris ensured a halt to the “lock him up” chants that have surfaced at her campaign rallies.
She regularly says that she should leave the matter to the judge.
The chant clashes with her campaign, which is based in part on preserving democracy and the long and order of what she calls the Trump threat — and is similar to the “lock her up” chants at Trump’s 2016 rallies that Democrats keep crying out.
‘Lock him up’: President Joe Biden said at a campaign event in New Hampshire that it was time to ‘lock him up,’ delivering the message for the Harris campaign by describing Donald Trump
Trump has long focused his own campaign on fighting the criminal cases against him, accusing rivals of pursuing “lawyer’s cases” against him.
He will be sentenced in September following his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying corporate documents, which could technically land him in prison, although many experts say the first-time white-collar offender will likely avoid jail time.
His son, Donald Trump Jr., responded to Biden’s comments.
“They don’t even hide it. The lawsuits against my father were always about election interference!’ he posted on X.
Trump’s own campaign rhetoric includes multiple threats to go after people he calls the “enemy within,” including Senate candidate Adam Schiff.
During his hush-money trial in New York, he has faced a surge in poll numbers and campaign donations, and has railed against “deranged” special counsel Jack Smith for filing charges against him in connection with his efforts to overturn the January 6 election. to undo.
Biden made the statement during a visit to a campaign office in Concord, New Hampshire
Biden was back on the campaign trail on a day when former President Barack Obama addressed a large rally for Harris
Biden, who has only occasionally hit the campaign trail after making a series of blunders, made the comment after saying Trump was talking about abolishing the Department of Education.
‘This is a man who also wants to replace every civil servant. Every single one. Things that, according to the Supreme Court’s ruling on immunity, he has the right to, if necessary, actually eliminate, physically eliminate, shoot and kill anyone he believes is a threat to him. I know this sounds bizarre. [If]“I said this five years ago, you’re going to lock me up, you’re going to lock him up,” he said.
“Lock him up politically,” he added.
While Trump has repeatedly railed against his political opponents and threatened to use the machinery of government to go after them, he has not discussed the possibility of killing people who pose a threat to him.
He continues to try to turn the Democrats’ own rhetoric against them.
“If we lose this election, we may not have a country anymore,” he said at his Doral golf club on Monday. ‘They say we may never have elections in this country again. This is where we’re going,” he said.
Democrats have raised growing concerns about whether Trump will declare victory again and refuse to accept the outcome of the election, as he did in 2020.
He was again coy when asked Saturday at a suburban McDonald’s drive-thru whether he would accept the election results regardless of the outcome.
“Yes, certainly, if it’s a fair election,” Trump said. ‘I would always accept it. It must be a fair election,” he said.
He continues to argue for a victory that is ‘too big to throw away’ – implying that his rivals will cheat without providing evidence.