Ex-Trump Spox Calls Out Trump And JD Vance As ‘Biggest Offenders’ In Pushing ‘Escalatory Rhetoric’

Former Trump White House communications director Alyssa Farah Griffin called out former President Donald Trump and his running mate Senator JD Vance (R-OH) as “the biggest offenders” when it comes to “escalatory” political rhetoric as the pair sought to blame liberals for the same.

Griffin appeared on CNN’s The Source With Kaitlin Collins on Monday to reflect on the aftermath of an alleged second attempt on Trump’s life after a plot to assassinate him was foiled by Secret Service agents on Sunday at his golf club in Florida.

Host Kaitlin Collins ran back a clip of Trump speaking during a Spaces livestream on social media platform X on Monday in which he discusses Democratic rhetoric and claims both his would-be assassins were from the “radical left.”

Griffin began: “Obviously, what happened was horrible. There’s going to be a lot that comes in the course of the investigation – never should have happened. It’d be terrible for the country, obviously, if anything were to happen to the former president, but the conversation today does need to be about political rhetoric.”

However, continuing, she didn’t shy away from naming names.

But one of the biggest offenders of escalatory rhetoric is Donald Trump and J.D. Vance. And the very clip or J.D. Vance says that he’s going to work on himself. He’s basically accusing Democrats of their rhetoric leading to this. And I think that it is this moment that is a moment for sobriety that calls for serious leadership. And unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be a self-reflective moment, even though it was the candidate, Donald Trump that himself was a victim.

And I just want to say this because Donald Trump put out this screed afterward, basically saying Democrats are responsible for the rhetoric, but then also saying they’re the enemy from within. That’s the kind of language our adversaries love to hear us throwing around. It tears us apart from within.

Griffin also rejected the claim pushed by Vance that Harris has not been subject to threats of violence or harm.

[Vice President] Kamala Harris has also faced threats and thankfully, she’s not actually become a target as directly as Donald Trump has. Over the weekend a right-wing [social media user] handle called essentially for harm to be done to her. This is something that happens every day online, but the step that it takes to then go further and somebody act, it’s actually a very small step and we’re all responsible for taking it down.

Watch above on CNN.