Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Mike Johnson, the top Republicans in Congress, criticized Vice President Kamala Harris for recent comments made about former President Donald Trump on the campaign trail, warning that they invite political violence.
“Vice President Harris may want the American people to entrust her with the sacred duty of executive authority,” they said in a joint statement. “But first, she must abandon the base and irresponsible rhetoric that endangers both American lives and institutions.”
The Republicans were responding to Harris calling Trump a “fascist” during a CNN town hall on Wednesday. Her characterization of her opponent in the presidential race echoed criticism from John KellyTrump’s former White House chief of staff, who told the New York Times that the former president met the definition of a fascist.
“Labeling a political opponent as a ‘fascist,’ risks inviting yet another would-be assassin to try robbing voters of their choice before Election Day,” McConnell and Johnson said.
They said Harris’ warning against political violence after a second assassination attempt against Trump in September rings hollow.
“In the weeks since that second sobering reminder, the Democratic nominee for president of the United States has only fanned the flames beneath a boiling cauldron of political animus,” the Republican congressional leaders said. “Her most recent and most reckless invocations of the darkest evil of the 20th century seem to dare it to boil over. The vice president’s words more closely resemble those of President Trump’s second would-be assassin than her own earlier appeal to civility.”
