Johnson and McConnell: Harris calling Trump ‘fascist’ could invite assassination attempt

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) issued a joint statement Friday condemning Vice President Harris for saying she believes former President Trump is a “fascist,” arguing that it could invite another assassination attempt.

“This summer, after the first attempted assassination of a presidential candidate in more than a century, President Biden insisted that ‘we can’t allow this violence to be normalized.’ In September, after President Trump escaped yet another close call, Vice President Harris acknowledged that ‘we all must do our part to ensure that this incident does not lead to more violence,’” Johnson and McConnell said in the statement.

“These words have proven 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. Her most recent and most reckless invocations of the darkest evil of the 20th century seem to dare it to boil over,” they said.

Harris has avoided using the word “fascist” directly to describe Trump. But when asked at a CNN town hall this week if she thinks Trump is a fascist, Harris replied: “Yes I do.”

CNN asked the question in the context of Trump's ex-White House chief of staff John Kelly saying that Trump “certainly falls into the general definition of fascist” in a interview in The New York Times.

“The Vice President's words more closely resemble those of President Trump's second would-be assassin than her own earlier appeal to civility,” Johnson and McConnell said, in reference to Ryan Wesley Routh, the man who was charged after allegedly plotting to kill Trump at the former president’s golf club in Florida.

“The man who was caught waiting in ambush in Florida left others with a chilling call to arms: ‘It is up to you now to finish the job’. Labeling a political opponent as a ‘fascist,’ risks inviting yet another would-be assassin to try robbing voters of their choice before Election Day,” Johnson and McConnell said.

Trump also survived an assassination attempt in July, when a 20-year-old shooter fired at him from the roof of an unsecured building during a rally in Butler, Pa. The incident left one rally attendee dead, Trump with an injured ear, and two rally attendees severely injured.

Trump, however, has also used the term fascist to describe Harris as he has doubled down on his insults against Harris and ratcheted up the intensity of his own rhetoric against political opponents.

“She’s a marxist, communist, fascist, socialist,” Trump said at a rally in Arizona in September.

Johnson and McConnell made no mention of Trump’s rhetoric in their statement, keeping the focus on their political rival.

“Vice President Harris may want the American people to entrust her with the sacred duty of executive authority. But first, she must abandon the base and irresponsible rhetoric that endangers both American lives and institutions,” Johnson and McConnell said in the statement. “We have both been briefed on the ongoing and persistent threats to former President Donald Trump by adversaries to the United States, and we call on the Vice President to take these threats seriously, stop escalating the threat environment, and help ensure President Trump has the necessary resources to be protected from those threats.”

The Harris campaign did not immediately comment on the statement.