ATLANTA (AP) – donald trump told Republican donors at his Florida resort this weekend that the president Joe Biden is running a “Gestapo administration”, the most recent example of the former president employing the language of Nazi Germany in his campaign rhetoric.
Saturday’s comments at Mar-a-Lago were described by people who attended the event and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private session.
The “Gestapo” comment, one person said, came as Trump renewed his complaint that the Biden White House is behind the presumptive Republican nominee’s multiple criminal prosecutions, including his continued silence on money and fraud trial in New York and additional cases arising from his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
The Gestapo was the secret police force of the Third Reich that suppressed political opposition generally and specifically targeted Jewish people for imprisonment during the Holocaust.
Republican Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota, who appeared Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union,” essentially confirmed Trump’s statement but tried to downplay its significance.
“This was a brief in-depth commentary on something that wasn’t really central to what he was talking about,” said Burgum, who is among the candidates to be Trump’s running mate.
Burgum said Trump drew the parallel as part of his accusation that the Biden White House is behind his legal troubles. “Most Americans,” Burgum said, “feel that the trial he is on now is politically motivated.”
The New York Times first reported Trump’s comments after obtaining an audio recording of the Mar-a-Lago event.
“These people run a Gestapo administration,” Trump told Republican donors, according to the newspaper. “It’s the only way they can win.”
Biden’s re-election campaign destroyed the reference.
“Trump is once again making despicable and insulting comments about the Holocaust, while attacking law enforcement, celebrating political violence and threatening our democracy,” Democratic campaign spokesman James Singer said in a statement. .
The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press. The AP did not obtain audio of Trump’s speech at the fundraiser.
Previously, in the 2024 campaign, Trump called political opponents “worms” and said that migrants crossing the US-Mexico border are “poisoning the blood of our country”, rhetoric that echoes statements made by Adolf Hitler during his government authoritarianism in Germany.
“I don’t know anything about Hitler,” Trump insisted in a December interview on conservative radio. “I have no idea what Hitler said except (what) I saw on the news. And that’s something very, totally different from what I’m saying.”
A second person who was at Mar-a-Lago this weekend described to the AP a turbulent lunch in which Trump mixed his grievances with an upbeat Republican Party crowd.
Speaking for at least 90 minutes, Trump promised that “the gloves will come off” against Biden, recalled the second Republican. At another point, Trump called several figures from Congress from the Republican Party to the stage and referred to the many Republicans who were vying for his choice for vice president.
“They’re lining up and begging,” Trump said, according to one attendee.
Several would-be candidates circulated through the crowd and received strategy talks or led panel discussions. Among the highlights, said the Republican, were Republican Senators Tim Scott of South Carolina, Marco Rubio of Florida and JD Vance of Ohio.
Trump, the person said, singled out Rubio for special praise and referred to a “Florida problem,” referring to a constitutional requirement that the president and vice president not claim the same state as their residences.
Rubio and Scott demurred when asked about their prospects on Sunday’s talk shows.
On “Fox News Sunday,” Rubio avoided the question of whether he would be willing to move to another state to join the Republican ticket.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., was also in attendance, reinforcing Trump’s support. Johnson coordinated one of the legal challenges to the 2020 elections that Trump lost to Biden, but the speaker of the House now faces the threat of his own impeachment by far-right Republicans led by Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.
In his time on stage, Johnson said the U.S. needs a “strong man” in the White House, one attendee told the AP.
The Republican National Committee said after the event that the RNC and campaign’s combined fundraising efforts for April exceeded $76 million, by far the best monthly effort of this campaign cycle and a step toward erasing Biden’s financial advantage . RNC Chairman Michael Whatley welcomed an increase in small-dollar donors, but the event at Mar-a-Lago clearly focused on the party’s deepest pockets. At one point, one attendee said, Trump offered an open mic to anyone who immediately pledged a $1 million contribution to the party. Two people finally agreed, the source said.
Additionally, the Times reported that Trump told his audience that Democrats effectively buy votes through economic safety net programs, while repeating his false claims that the US elections are rife with systemic fraud.
“When you’re a Democrat, you essentially start at 40% because you have public service, you have unions and you have welfare,” Trump said, according to the Times. “And don’t underestimate well-being. They get welfare to vote, and on top of that, they cheat – they cheat.”
Biden’s victory was confirmed by multiple recounts in many swing states, and Trump’s claims of fraud have been rejected by several state and federal courts, including by judges he appointed to the bench. Trump’s efforts to overturn the election and his role in the riot by his supporters at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, are the subject of two additional charges.
Trump is not the first Republican presidential candidate to privately associate social programs with the Democrats’ electoral success. In 2012, then-GOP candidate Mitt Romney was caught on tape at a fundraiser declaring that Democrat Barack Obama had a built-in advantage because of people he said did not have to pay federal income taxes. .
“There are 47% of people who will vote for the president (Obama) no matter what” because they are “dependent on the government” and “believe they are victims,” Romney said, adding that “my job is not to worry about those people. I will never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and take charge of their lives.”
The Obama campaign, with Biden as vice president, used those comments to bolster Democrats’ argument that Romney, a wealthy businessman, was out of touch with most Americans. Obama was reelected.
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Mascaro reported from Washington.
