Oct. 23 (UPI) — Vice President Kamala Harris on Wednesday said former President Donald Trump wants a “military that is loyal to him” and not the U.S. Constitution.
Her comments came in response to Trump’s longtime chief of staff John Kelly recently saying the former president is an authoritarian who idolizes tyrants such as Russian President Vladmir Putin and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Kelly also said Trump has praised the loyalty that he said German generals showed to Hitler during WWII.
Harris held a press conference from her official residence at the Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C., a day after Kelly also accused Trump of being a “fascist.”
Harris told media Trump “wants a military that will obey his orders even when he tells them to break the law or abandon their own oath to the Constitution of the United States.”
She said Trump “repeatedly called his fellow Americans the ‘enemy from within’ and even said that he would use the United States military to go after American citizens.”
Harris said Trump considers the “enemy from within” to be “anyone who refuses to bend a knee or dares to criticize him.”
She said Trump promised to “be a dictator on day one and vowed to use the military as his personal militia to carry out his personal and political vendettas.”
Harris spoke for about three minutes and immediately left the room without taking questions.
Retired Marine General and former White House Chief of Staff Kelly said in interviews published Tuesday that Trump fits the “general definition of fascist.”
Kelly also said Trump has praised the “kind of generals Hitler had” despite many of Hitler’s generals and other military officers trying to assassinate him and nearly succeeding in 1944.
The former president’s campaign pushed back on Kelly’s comments and Harris’ response to them.
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said Kelly “beclowned himself with these debunked stories he has fabricated,” NPR reported Wednesday.
Responding to Harris’ comments, Cheung called her a “stone-cold loser who is increasingly desperate because she is flailing and her campaign is in shambles.”
Harris “continues to peddle outright lies and falsehoods that are easily disproven,” Cheung said.
“The fact is that Kamala’s dangerous rhetoric is directly to blame for the multiple assassination attempts against President Trump and she continues to stoke the flames of violence all in the name of politics,” Cheung added.
