I’ve written a few times in recent weeks about the pretzels into which Donald Trump’s Republican allies are twisting his words as they try to defend and explain away his sinister remarks about deploying the military domestically to go after his “enemy.” The rhetoric has been a throughline of Trump’s campaign, as he and alumni of his first administration threaten to use the military as a goon squad to crack down on Americans if elected.
His Republican allies have defended the remarks in all sorts of creative and interesting ways, with many offering alternative ideas for who he might be talking about instead of his political rivals. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin got imaginative recently when he suggested that Trump is actually talking about undocumented immigrants when he says “enemy from within.”
“What I want to just make very clear is that it’s my belief that what former President Trump is talking about are the people that are coming over the border, that in fact are committing crimes, that are bringing drugs, that are trafficking humans, and that are turning every state into a border state,” Youngkin said.
But in recent weeks Trump has doubled down on his remarks, and has made it clear repeatedly that he does, in fact, actually mean his political rivals: Democratic politicians. Specifically, Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff.
During his rally in Albuquerque, New Mexico this afternoon, he reiterated that he’s talking about Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), the person he blames for his impeachments. Today, he called him “total scum.”
“There’s no tougher job than being president and we get hit from the enemy inside, you know that right? We get hit by the Adam Schiffs of the world,” he said. “He’s scum, total scum. They made up Russia Russia Russia hoax, they made up all the impeachment hoaxes, they make it up. They’re bad people.”
Can’t be more explicit than that.
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