Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance on Monday defended Donald Trump’s description of his political rivals as the “enemy from within,” claiming the former president simply “speaks from the heart.”
In an interview with Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom,” Vance weighed in on why Trump finds it necessary to repeat comments that have been widely denounced as “un-American.”
“Donald Trump is unfiltered,” Vance said. “I think this is one of the reasons why the campaign has gone well, is because he’s not doing a basement campaign strategy. He’s not just running on slogans. When people ask him questions, he speaks from the heart.”
Earlier this month, Trump told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo that “the bigger problem is the enemy from within,” when asked if the American public should be worried about potential violence from “outside agitators” on Election Day.
“We have some very bad people, we have some sick people, radical left lunatics,” Trump told Bartiromo. “And it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military.”
When asked to clarify those remarks over the weekend, Trump doubled down, singling out Representative Adam Schiff and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“These are bad people. We have a lot of bad people,” Trump told Fox News’ “Media Buzz.” “But when you look at ‘Shifty Schiff’ and some of the others, yeah, they are, to me, the enemy from within. I think Nancy Pelosi is an enemy from within.”
When Vance was pressed on Trump’s attacks against the two Democrats, the Ohio senator baselessly claimed that both have “been really part of weaponising the Department of Justice against our country.”
“I think what Donald Trump is saying is, look, we are the strongest country in the world, we’ve got the best people in the world, but we do have some broken leadership,” Vance said.
Vance added that Pelosi is “obsessed” with Trump, and argued that it’s “totally reasonable” for the GOP nominee to assert that “we do have some broken leaders in Washington.”
Senator Lindsey Graham also defended Trump’s remarks in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” this Sunday, downplaying the suggestion that the former president’s rhetoric could hurt his standing with disaffected Republican voters.
“We’re winning, and going to win, not because of what Donald Trump’s saying, but because of what they’ve done for four years,” Graham said in reference to the Biden administration.