Donald Trump says Robert L. Dear, who killed three people at a Planned Parenthood center in Colorado on Friday, is a “maniac” who did a “terrible thing.”
Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press” with Chuck Todd on Sunday, Trump brushed off criticism relating to the rhetoric around the Planed Parenthood videos, suggesting, “I think he is a sick person. And I think he was probably a person ready to go. We don’t even know the purpose. I mean, he hasn’t come out to the best of my knowledge with a statement as to why it happened to be at that location.”(RELATED: Media Rushes To Blame Christians, Republicans For Planned Parenthood Shooting)
“Well, I think it’s terrible, I mean terrible. I think it’s more of the same and I think it’s a terrible thing and he’s a maniac,” Trump explained.
Regarding reports of the Dear talking about “baby parts” to law enforcement officials, Trump said, “Well, I will tell you there is a tremendous group of people that think it’s terrible, that all of the videos that they have seen with some of these people from Planned Parenthood talking about it like you’re selling parts to a car.”
“I mean there are a lot of people that are very unhappy about that,” Trump suggested. “I know some of the tapes were perhaps not pertinent. I know that a couple of people that were running for office or are running for office on the Republican side were commenting on tapes that weren’t appropriate, but there were many tapes that are appropriate and in terms of commenting on. And there are people that are extremely upset about it. It looks like you’re talking about parts to some machine or something and they’re not happy about it.”
Todd pressed Trump and asked him if he was “surprised that someone would take an extreme reaction” to the Planned Parenthood videos, and Trump said, “Well this is an extremist and this was a man who obviously, and they said prior to this that he was mentally disturbed, so he’s a mentally disturbed person. There’s not question about that.”
“There’s tremendous, there’s tremendous dislike” of what Planned Parenthood is doing and “I see a lot of anxiety, I see a lot of dislike for Planned Parenthood, there’s no question about that,” Trump explained.