CNN host Boris Sanchez questioned Republican Pennsylvania Rep. Dan Meuser on Monday about how former President Donald Trump could tone down his “rhetoric” just a day after a second suspect attempted to assassinate him.
On Sunday, federal and local officials confirmed the arrest of 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh, who allegedly attempted to assassinate the former president in West Palm Beach, Florida. During “CNN News Central,” Meuser criticized the media and Democrat’s rhetoric as “pretty awful” and suggested there is “work to do on both sides,” however, Sanchez pushed back, highlighting Trump’s past comments.
“I think that is a significant and important sentiment that we’re all Americans in the end. It’s obviously important to condemn political violence in all shapes and forms, but I am curious about how you make assessments given, as you said, that it‘s a two-way street. Because pretty much since he rode down the escalator back in 2015, Donald Trump has been a firebrand. He‘s made accusations that Hillary Clinton, that Barak Obama, that Joe Biden, that Kamala Harris are all trying to destroy this country,” Sanchez said.
“He also uses rhetoric that dehumanizes people, including immigrants. And notably, there was a mass shooter in El Paso a few years ago that echoed that specific kind of language,” Sanchez continued. “So I wonder what your message would be to the former president himself, as you said, it‘s a two-way street on toning down the rhetoric.”
Meuser then stated the media presents Trump’s comments in the “darkest ways possible,” with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris being painted in the opposite light. (RELATED: ‘Don’t You Realize?’: J.D. Vance Calls Out Dana Bash For Being ‘Engaged In Basic Propaganda’)
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“Boris, we could probably debate this and go tit for tat along the way, because when he says things like comrade Kamala or sleepy Joe or it‘s stupid people doing the Iran [nuclear] deal and things like that. Look, he also said that the illegals that are coming here are poisoning our youth and poisoning our citizens. I‘ve heard it all. But truly what he meant there was the fentanyl, the drugs, that sort of thing — they’re poisoning the blood,” Meuser responded.
“It gets presented, in my opinion, throughout much of the media in the darkest ways possible. And [with] Vice President Harris and Joe Biden, it very often gets painted in the best way possible. But then you have other networks that certainly lay it out in the opposite of that. All I would say is we ought to really consider our language, not make things personal, lose the personal attacks,” Meuser continued. “Let’s have a policy debate. Let’s do our best to find common ground, but where we can’t, that’s where elections come in and people are going to vote for which way we want our country to go.”
At the time of the incident, Routh had been in the bushes with an “AK-47 style rifle with a scope. Two backpacks which were hung on the fence that had ceramic tile in them and a GoPro, which he was going to take pictures of,” according to Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw. Campaign finance records show that the 58-year-old appears to have donated over $100 to ActBlue, as he made multiple contributions to the 2020 presidential campaigns of Tom Steyer, Andrew Yang, Tulsi Gabbard and Beto O’Rourke.
While Routh appears to have once supported the former president in 2016, his social media posts suggest he has since changed his opinion on Trump, stating in 2020 he would “be glad when” when the former president was “gone,” according to CNN.
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