Vice President Kamala Harris didn’t hesitate to answer Tuesday night when she was asked if she believes former President Donald Trump is a fascist: “Yes, I do.”
She used the first minutes of a CNN town hall — where she had the stage to herself because Trump turned down a debate — to outline her case that Trump would be an authoritarian leader.
But the Democratic presidential candidate said voters don’t have to take her word for it — they can take it from some members of his own party.
“The people who know Donald Trump best, the people who worked with him in the White House, in the Situation Room, in the Oval Office — all Republicans, by the way, who served in his administration — his former chief of staff, his national security, secretaries of defense and his vice president have all called him unfit and dangerous.”
Trump’s former White House chief of staff John Kelly has been making his own case this week that Trump is a threat to democracy.
The Atlantic reported on an exchange between Kelly and Trump in which Trump expressed desire for his generals to be like Hitler’s to Kelly. And in an interview with The New York Times, Kelly said Trump was “certainly an authoritarian” and that he “admires people who are dictators.”
Harris argued during the town hall that Kelly and others should be trusted on the matter. She addressed Kelly’s comments earlier Tuesday, saying Trump wants “a military that is loyal to him personally.” She made the same case at the town hall.
“Go online and listen to John Kelly, his voice, talking about what he thinks of Donald Trump two weeks before the election,” Harris said, referring to audio included in The New York Times’ reporting.
Harris argued this was Kelly’s “911 call to the American people,” a last effort before the election to convince voters of the implications of another Trump administration. Harris said if Trump took office again, there would not be people like Kelly to “hold him back” anymore.
“At least before, there were folks who would know what he would say, but they would restrain him,” Harris said.
Later during the town hall, Harris was less direct when confronted with a question on whether she believes Trump is antisemitic.
“Again, I invite you to listen and go online to listen to John Kelly, the former chief of staff of Donald Trump, who has told us Donald Trump said essentially, ‘Why aren’t my generals like those of Hitler’s?’” Harris said. “We’ve heard the reports for years.”
—
Em Luetkemeyer is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.