CUMMING, Ga. — Former President Donald Trump doubled down Tuesday on his remarks over the weekend referring to Democrats as the “enemy from within.”
During a taped town hall of all-women voters in Cumming, Georgia, with Fox News’ Harris Faulkner, the host asked Trump about his “enemy from within” comment, which he made during the network’s “Sunday Morning Futures” this past weekend.
During that interview, Trump told host Maria Bartiromo that California Rep. Adam Schiff and other Democrats were “lunatics” and a bigger threat to the U.S. than foreign adversaries like Russia or China.
“I always say, we have two enemies,” Trump said, adding: “We have the outside enemy, and then we have the enemy from within, and the enemy from within, in my opinion, is more dangerous than China, Russia and all these countries.”
He also suggested that the military could be called in to handle any unrest on Election Day from “radical left lunatics.”
Trump doubled down on those comments during his Tuesday night town hall, also calling Democrats “evil” and “dangerous.”
“They’re Marxists and communists and fascists, and they’re sick,” Trump added. “We have China, we have Russia, we have all these countries. If you have a smart president, they can all be handled. The more difficult are, you know, the Pelosis, these people, they’re so sick and they’re so evil,” Trump said.
The town hall airs at 11 a.m. Wednesday.
Vice President Kamala Harris has used Trump’s comments against him this week, calling a second Trump term “dangerous” at a Pennsylvania rally and releasing an ad titled “Enemy Within.”
Harris called Trump “increasingly unstable and unhinged,” saying he plans to use the military against American citizens and is “out for unchecked power.”
“A second Trump term is a huge risk for America,” she told supporters in Erie, Pennsylvania.
Faulkner gave Trump a chance to clarify his comments Tuesday at the town hall taping, asking him how he responded to Harris’ claims that he was “unhinged” and “out for unchecked power.”
Trump defended his comments, calling them “a nice presentation.”
“I wasn’t unhinged,” Trump said.
He also doubled down on his claims about Schiff, who led the prosecution in his first Senate impeachment trial.
“I use a guy like Adam Schiff because they made up the Russia, Russia hoax,” Trump said. “It took two years to solve the problem. Absolutely nothing was done wrong, etc, etc. They’re dangerous for our country.”
Asked to comment on Trump’s Tuesday remarks, a Schiff spokesman pointed to a pair of posts on X that the congressman in response to Trump’s Sunday interview.
“Donald Trump is openly threatening to call in the military to suppress his political opponents,” one of the posts reads. “We must defeat him this November and never let him fulfill his dictatorial ambitions.”
Representatives for Harris’ campaign and Pelosi did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
