“This man has fought—in more ways than one—for your state,” President Trump said about Montana’s Republican U.S. Rep. Greg Gianforte in a speech there Thursday. “He is a fighter and a winner.”
This was an unmistakable reference to Gianforte body-slamming reporter Ben Jacobs of the Guardian the day before the Montana special election last year. “Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground behind him,” according to a Fox News reporter who witnessed it.
After the assault, Gianforte told police that the “liberal media … is trying to make a story,” according to police records uncovered by the Guardian, and Gianforte’s spokesperson blamed Jacobs for starting the fight. Gianforte eventually pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and said in a letter to Jacobs, “Notwithstanding anyone’s statements to the contrary, you did not initiate any physical contact with me, and I had no right to assault you.”
Trump’s praise for Gianforte’s violence was especially remarkable in light of another moment from Thursday’s speech in which Trump predicted that his own impeachment would wreck the political stability of the U.S.
“You’ll have a country that’s going to turn into a third world country” is what Trump said would happen if he were removed from office despite “doing a great job.” He speculated that there would be a continuing cycle of impeachments whenever an opposite party controlled the House of Representatives. “If it does happen, it’s your fault, because you didn’t go out to vote … that’s the only way it could happen.”
“Today’s Democrat party is held hostage by haters … left-wing haters, angry mobs, deep-state radicals, and their fake news allies,” Trump said, energizing a crowd that had, minutes before, seemed puzzled by his praise for books about him by Fox News host Jeannine Pirro and Fox analyst Gregg Jarrett.
Those “angry mobs,” Trump has said privately, “will overturn everything that we’ve done and they’ll do it quickly and violently,” he told evangelical leaders during a White House meeting, the New York Times reported. “They will end everything immediately. … When you look at antifa and you look at some of these groups, these are violent people.”
When those are the stakes and that’s how threatening your opponents are, of course Trump believes it’s conquer or be conquered. No wonder he thinks roughing up a journalist isn’t so bad.
