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LONDONDERRY: Just accepted the Republican nomination, US President Donald Trump spoke harsh words for anti-racist protesters Friday during a campaign stop in the politically important state of New Hampshire.
Addressing a crowd in an airport hangar, Trump called protesters who tried to disrupt his White House speech Thursday night as “thugs” and said Senator Rand Paul may have been killed when protesters later assaulted him. .
Paul said Friday that he was attacked by an “angry mob” of more than 100 people near the White House and had to be rescued by police.
“Either he would be in very bad shape or dead, and that would include his wife, if those cops weren’t there,” Trump said of the Republican senator.
The president has emphasized a “law and order” theme to motivate his political base and attract more voters as he follows former Vice President Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate, in national polls ahead of the Nov. 3 election.
“You know what I’m saying? Protesters, your ass. I’m not talking about my ass,” he said. “They’re not protesters. Those aren’t protesters. Those are anarchists, they’re troublemakers, they’re troublemakers, they’re looters.”
Trump has been criticized for failing to show empathy in the wake of the shooting and killings of black men by police, including George Floyd, who died in police custody in Minneapolis in May, sparking anti-racism demonstrations around the world.
New protests erupted this week in Kenosha, Wisconsin, after police officers shot Jacob Blake, another African-American man, several times in front of his children. Survived.
Thousands of people participated in a march in Washington on Friday to denounce racism.
Trump hasn’t commented much on Blake, but he spoke extensively about the protesters on Friday without specifying which rally he was talking about.
“They are just looking for trouble. This has nothing to do with George Floyd, it has nothing to do with anything. They don’t even know who George Floyd is, ”he said.
Biden and his running mate, vice presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris, said Trump was making the United States less safe with his rhetoric and handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
“The president incites violence, inspires white supremacist shooters, and his failed Covid response is costing thousands of lives a day. When you look at the world right now, ask yourself: Do you feel safe in Trump’s America? ”. Biden tweeted.
“He (Trump) has been obsessed, I think, with spreading fear and using division to protect his own ego, and more fundamentally to erode the foundations of the democracy he is sworn to uphold,” Harris said at a fundraiser on Friday.
Close the New Hampshire race
Trump, whose speech to the Republican National Convention was low-key compared to his appearances at rallies, seemed to find his footing in New Hampshire, a state he narrowly lost to Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016 and where he is behind Biden this year.
He reviewed some of his favorite topics, including his insistence that Mexico would pay for a wall along the U.S. border and that Democrats would try to cut funding for law enforcement.
Biden has rejected calls from the left to “defund” the police, but Trump has erroneously suggested that it is a policy that Biden would adopt.
Trump, who has criticized Biden for campaigning primarily from his home in Delaware because of the pandemic, intends to travel extensively in the coming months to boost his momentum.
It has not been able to hold its large rallies for most of the virus outbreak. A June rally at an indoor stadium in Tulsa, Oklahoma, drew a crowd that was well below capacity. The area saw an increase in coronavirus cases for weeks after the event.
Trump had to cancel a July rally in New Hampshire over concerns about a tropical storm off the East Coast.
Biden hopes his in-person campaign trip will resume after Labor Day on Sept. 7, telling attorneys at an online fundraising event Thursday that he was considering traveling to battle states like Wisconsin, Minnesota. , Pennsylvania and Arizona.
“We will go out and find people where it matters, not at irresponsible or organized rallies for ego boosting, but communities of real people, in real local businesses, in their lives,” Biden said. “I’m going to keep everyone safe.”
Some 21.6 million Americans watched Trump’s keynote address Thursday night, according to preliminary rating data on Friday that suggested a smaller television audience for Trump than Biden. Trump, a former reality star, cares deeply about ratings.
