Amid Trump’s incendiary rhetoric, radicals on both sides of political divide see violence as justified

Robert A. Pape, a political scientist who studies political violence, has little doubt that former President Trump has made more incendiary comments than Vice President Kamala Harris. “Doing counts of how many times does Trump say something outrageous versus how many times the Democrats say something outrageous is actually meaningless.” That dynamic has created a frustrating dilemma for Democrats and other Trump critics who see his attacks on Democrats’ rhetoric as hypocritical and believe their own statements — that Trump is an existential threat to democracy — are accurate and necessary. Trump’s social media post this week accusing Harris of taking “politics in our Country to a whole new level of Hatred, Abuse, and Distrust” was couched in incendiary language, referring to his opponent as “Comrade Kamala Harris,” repeating claims that she uses “Communist Left Rhetoric” and accusing her of allowing millions of migrants — whom he labels criminals, terrorists and mentally ill — to “INVADE and take over our Country.” By the time his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, echoed similar complaints in a speech Monday, many of their opponents were aghast, accusing the duo of “gaslighting” the public. There is nothing inconsistent about defending our democracy and deploring the use of political violence — indeed they go hand in hand.” Most of the Trump campaign’s specific complaints about Democrats involve Harris and others calling the former president a threat to democracy, which it says provokes a potentially violent response by raising the stakes of the election to existential terms. But after the second apparent attempt to target Trump on Sunday, he struck a more unifying tone, calling Trump in a conversation that both men described as cordial and making public statements reinforcing that “in America, there is no place for political violence.” Harris said she called Trump to check on him Tuesday, echoing Biden’s language that a healthy democracy requires resolving differences peacefully.