Presidential candidate in campaign mode Trump on Trump: "This is not drivel, this is genius"
Two days after a second assassination attempt, Donald Trump is using the events for his election campaign. "Only great presidents get shot," he told supporters in Michigan. It was not the only self-praise.
The Republican presidential candidate for the November election made a connection between the assassination attempt and his plans for high tariffs on car imports from Mexico and China in Flint, a city that has been bled dry by the closure of car factories. "And then we wonder why I get shot," the 78-year-old billionaire interjected.
His Democratic rival, US Vice President Kamala Harris, who was on a trip to Pennsylvania, called the Republican on Tuesday "to tell him directly that she's glad he's safe," according to a White House official.
"Friendly"
The conversation was "cordial and brief," the same source said. "I told him what I have already stated publicly: There is no place for violence in our country," the 59-year-old Democrat subsequently reported during a conversation with an association of black journalists (NABJ) in Philadelphia.
The Democrat was "no friendlier" during the call, Donald Trump said on Tuesday. On Monday, he had judged that the suspect, who was arrested in Florida on Sunday for the alleged attempted murder of him, "echoed the speech of Biden and Harris and acted accordingly".
"Bullets are whistling because of this communist left-wing rhetoric and it's only going to get worse," the Republican candidate, who did not repeat these accusations on Tuesday in Flint, had railed.
His supporters said they were incited by the attacks on their champion. "They want to kill Trump so he can't run for a second term," 71-year-old Donald Owen, who attended the public event, told the AFP news agency, adding, "If someone took a shot at Trump, I'd be the first one to fly into the bullets."
"Genius"
During the election rally, Trump presented himself as the savior of the auto industry from foreign competition, saying, "If a tragedy happens and we don't win, there will be no jobs in the auto industry, no jobs in the industry."
He also responded to attacks from the other side on his sometimes incoherent digressions, saying, "I respond with long and sometimes very complex sentences and paragraphs, but it all makes sense."
"That's not drivel, that's genius," the Republican said after rambling on about hydrocarbon production and mentioning an oil field in "Bagram, Alaska" that was "bigger than all of Saudi Arabia".
Donald Trump apparently confused Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan with an area in Alaska called the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).
Billie Eilish
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are touring the six or seven "swing states," the crucial states, while the Democrat appears to be making a slight uptick in the polls since the Sept. 10 debate, in which she was widely seen as dominating her opponent.
The candidate, who is already backed by pop star Taylor Swift, also received support from pop star Billie Eilish on Tuesday.
In her interview in Philadelphia, Kamala Harris condemned Donald Trump's role in spreading false reports about Haitian migrants eating dogs and cats in the small town of Springfield, Ohio.
"This is a real scandal," she said of the turmoil that has since rocked the town, which has seen one bomb threat and closure of public facilities after another. "You cannot be entrusted with the responsibility of being president of the United States if you engage in this kind of hate speech."
SDA