Former President Donald Trump was the target of an apparent second assassination attempt on Sunday. Although the accused would-be assassin voted for Trump in 2016, that hasn’t stopped the former president from blaming the incident on his opponent.
“The would-be assassin believed the rhetoric of Biden and Harris, and yesterday, he acted on it,” a Trump campaign fundraising pitch sent out Monday morning said. “She’s trying to incite the most extreme elements in her base."
Michael Steele, who served as chairman of the Republican National Committee from 2009 to 2011, joined KNX News’ daily political show Countdown 2024. He said he doesn’t believe there’s “any merit at all” to Trump’s claim that Democrats are responsible for inciting violence.
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“Democrats have not threatened violence if they lose the election in November,” he said. “And that’s not been the narrative out of Donald Trump, using inflammatory language in front of a base that is easily instigated into a hot response.”
He added that Trump is “not taking responsibility for his contribution to this environment” in which people feel political violence is acceptable. After uncharacteristic calls for unity at the Republican convention after the first attempt on his life, Trump quickly went back to his old violent rhetoric.
“I'm not buying the mea culpa or his efforts to, you know, move the country away from a space that he quite frankly doesn't mind it being in,” Steele said.
Steele was skeptical that anyone in Trump’s inner circle could dissuade him from continuing to use such dangerous language.
“If he thinks that there is a transactional reason, meaning he gets something out of it or there's somehow it benefits him, he's going to do it,” he said.
As for how gunmen keep getting in Trump’s vicinity despite heightened security, former Secret Service agent Cheryl Tyler, who served on the protective details of presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, told Countdown 2024 they’re doing the best they can under the circumstances.
“If that event is on the schedule, then an advanced team would have done all the work that they're supposed to do. The problem that I will say a lot of people have is just understanding the difference [between] an impromptu and a scheduled event,” she said. “If I'm that protectee and I decide at the last minute I wanna go play tennis or I wanna go skiing, then we just go.”
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Biden said Monday that the Secret Service “needs more help” and called on Congress to give the agency more resources, but Tyler said giving new or retired agents the proper training to go into the field will take time.
Catch new episodes of Countdown 2024 live at 2:30 p.m. every weekday through Election Day.
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