Democratic California Rep. Adam Schiff said Thursday that he is more concerned over President Donald Trump wanting to “lock him up” than Trump saying he has “a watermelon head.”
“Well, Andrea, you know, the childhood kind of insults are one thing, it’s just demeaning to the office of the presidency. But what was more concerning at that rally and at others is the president saying that the chairman of the intelligence committee should be locked up, leading a chant of ‘Lock him up,’” Schiff told MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports.”
“At one point this week he said that something ‘should happen to Adam Schiff,'” the congressman continued. “There is no disguising the threatening nature of those words.” He said the “president’s words incite violence” and “terrorist plots” like the foiled kidnapping attempt against Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. (RELATED: ‘It Needs To Stop’: Gretchen Whitmer Points To Trump’s Rhetoric At Rally For Putting ‘Lives In Danger’)
Earlier this month, federal authorities charged six people — allegedly involved with a state militia group — who were planning to kidnap Whitmer.
Schiff said it was necessary to “take these things seriously” and not wait “until there is tragedy.” He encouraged Trump’s words to be “condemned by people on either side of the aisle as being dangerous and destabilizing and unpresidential in any way.”
Host Andrea Mitchell played a clip from Trump’s Wednesday night rally in Gastonia, North Carolina, where the president said Schiff has “a watermelon head.” At other times, Trump has called the congressman a “pencil neck.”
“Do you have any understanding of why he has targeted you?” Mitchell asked Schiff after noting that the House Intelligence Committee chairman had led the impeachment hearings against the president. Schiff claimed for years that he had evidence of Trump colluding with Russia. (RELATED: Rep. Schiff Has Done 419 TV Interviews Pushing Russian Collusion Conspiracy)
President Donald Trump talks to the media outside the White House on October 21, 2020 in Washington, DC. President Trump is headed to a rally in Gastonia, North Carolina, as he ramps up his public event schedule with less than two weeks until the election. (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
“This is the stuff of tin pot dictators, Andrea, not a president of the United States,” Schiff told Mitchell.
In a New Yorker interview, Schiff said that Trump “doesn’t give a sh*t about what’s good for our country.”