‘I think the bigger problem are the people from within, we have some very bad people, sick people, radical left lunatics,’ Republican candidate tells Fox’s Maria Bartiromo

“And it should be easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military,” he said.

“I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within. Not even the people who have come in, who are destroying our country.”

It isn’t clear under what circumstances Trump would view it justifiable to call in US troops against his own countrymen.

But his comments mark a baseless attack and a particularly hollow one coming from someone whose supporters violently attacked the US Capitol in an attempt to stop him from being thrown out of office three years ago.


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  • njm1314@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    For the millionth time all leftists should be armed. Cannot stress enough how important that is.

    • helloworld55@lemm.ee
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      1 month ago

      What would be grounds for lethal action? Self defense against the national guard? An ar-15 won’t be able to do much against that. The only option for your own survival is not to play

        • helloworld55@lemm.ee
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          1 month ago

          That’s fair. Personally, I am no soldier, I intend to flee if the US become a battleground, and I would encourage, even go out of my way to help, my friends and family flee as well. I would really oppose anyone I know dying for a political cause.

    • spyd3r@sh.itjust.works
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      1 month ago

      lol, leftists here are doing everything they can to take away the right of the people to keep and bear arms.

      • D1G17AL@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        That type of comment may have gone over well back on reddit but, sir, we are not idiots here. UTTER BULLSHIT, LEFTISTS DO NOT WANT TO TAKE AWAY YOUR RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS. We want that right too. We just don’t want mentally ill people having access to assault weapons with which they can kill many, many people with significantly reduced effort. Someone going on a rampage with a pistol or a shotgun is far less deadly than someone with a long rifle of any type, especially automatic rifles. BULL-FUCKING-SHIT LEFTIST DO NOT WANT TO TAKE THAT RIGHT AWAY.

        • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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          1 month ago

          You rant loudly but wrongly about “assault weapons”. The fact is that pistols are used to kill far more people in the USA (and elsewhere) than “assault weapons” and any other kind of rifle. 3% or less of all homicides involve any kind of rifle.

          • Koarnine@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            1 month ago

            Go on, name the leftists doing that. That’s liberal shit.

            Furthermore how many mass shootings are committed with hand guns? Mass shootings are the target of ‘assault weapon’ rhetoric, not gun violence. And any one with a more than surface level knowledge understands how silly the framing and blaming on AR style guns has been.

            But to call that ‘coming from the left’ is insanity. The media if staunchy neoliberal, the politicians are too. The dems pushing that gun control are just as right wing as the ‘moderate conservatives’, they are reactionary liberals all the same bud. Reactionary liberals are the types who call for such extreme bans (books, guns, abortion, contraception).

            Every leftist I’ve ever met is completely for the right to bear arms. Other than the ones who realise that against the advanced military might of nations in 2024 owning your own gun of any capacity is meaningless (against state tyranny).

            The state has a monopoly on violence bud, owning a high capacity rifle will not protect you from state tyranny, neither will a hand gun. But a hand gun is a far more effective self defense tool for home defense than an AR15. So if it’s not for state tyranny, and its not for self defense, it’s either pure gun fetishism or you have a purpose to unload the high capacity ammunition rapidly (that could be 40 wild hogs or you know 40 wild schoolchildren).

            That being said, I still think you should be able to get them. Its called ‘gun control’ you know, background checks, ensuring safety. Not ‘ban all guns’.

            Responsible owners are no problem in my book, nor does banning a gun platform make sense. Curtailing the constant terrorism against our children and minoritys should be a high priority for anyone though. Left or right, its not simply ‘a fact of life’.

            Anyway brain dump but main point is y’all mfers need to stop conflating centre libbies with the left. Its fucking mind numbing.

      • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Military weapons? Yeah. They should be.

        Pistols? Shotguns? Not really. And yes, you can point to more extreme cases of ‘liberals’ who do want to amend the constitution, which is about the same thing as calling anyone even slightly conservative on one issue a fascist.

        • yeather@lemmy.ca
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          1 month ago

          OMG! The former president is threatening mass violence and possible oppression by using the US Military on the citizens! Oh btw you shouldn’t have a weapon that looks like the one the military uses or shoots faster than those made 100 years ago.

          The AR-15 is not a military weapon, purely civilian. In any case you should be able to own military firearms, the government is not to be trusted.

          • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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            1 month ago

            An AK is a better fit, lol.

            But (just going with this for a second) I dont see a scenario where even having like an M240 is going to make much of a difference going up against the US military. What do you picture happening, a good honest firefight? At that point homemade bombs and such are your only resort where a pistol wouldn’t work.

            • yeather@lemmy.ca
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              1 month ago

              Iraq and Afghanistan and Vietnam have left the chat. Why is this talking point always used to counter gun rights? It’s objectively not true ans has been proven time and time again. It’s guerilla / asymmetrical warfare, thr gov has to come to you.

              The AKs available to the US consumer are also not weapons of war, they are strictly semi automatic.

              An M240 would be a major upgrade in such a scenario. It would be more effective than a pistol, ideally you would have people with M240s and people making IEDs.

              • stoned_ape@lemmy.world
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                1 month ago

                Yes. Gravy Team 6 has spent generations fighting an asymmetrical war against Russia then the US and I’m sure they train every day at Taliban compounds or are remnants of the Republican Guard

                Be real: they sit in their garage drinking shitty beer and jerking off their unsatisfying-to-anyone cocks to guns, trucks, and Trump

                I mean, they did a great job Jan 6, when Babbitt did not comply, of fighting back and showing big ol tyrannical gov! /s

                Jk, they ran like little girls as soon as the reality set in

                Lemme see any of these fucks hump full battle rattle 15 miles before we talk about them staging an insurgent war against the US

                Christ, I bet all but a handful can’t do a single pull-up

                Yes, there are people in that culture that are capable of small-arms engagement, using fire and maneuver to close with engage and destroy the enemy, but the VAST majority of them are fatbody chodes who fantasize about living in right-wing Divergence or some other young adult fantasy novel series

                • yeather@lemmy.ca
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                  1 month ago

                  In a most likely scenario, this ends up being a quick decapitation strike at those attempting to hold the Republic together, or ends up being a low engagement years long drawn out war. The military would be reluctant on both sides, leading to mostly an arms race of local and state police battling disgruntled / rioting citizens with some groups of more organized cells. The Troubles and not GWOT.

            • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net
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              1 month ago

              a semi-auto AK and an AR are functionally identical for most practical purposes.

              As for the scenario proposed: any direct long engangement would be suicide, but other tactics would be viable. The most likely scenario in the US would look something like The Troubles in Ireland.

              But it’s possible a significant portion the military could defect, which could make things look a little more like the Spanish Civil War.

              Also, I would point to the existence of Rojava, which for years has been able to hold out against Turkey despite Turkey having access to significantly more sophisticated hardware.

            • catloaf@lemm.ee
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              1 month ago

              The US military failed to fight insurgents in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. What makes you think they’d be any better against an insurgency in the US, especially when it’d involve a good portion of people in their own ranks?

              • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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                1 month ago

                You guys are living a fantasy if you think a large chunk of the US population will turn into the Taliban, Viet Cong, Mujahideen or whatever over which party is in the govt and whatever antics you think Trump or Harris get up to.

                We live in a rich, militarized surveillance state. A rifle is not how you fight that.

                • catloaf@lemm.ee
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                  1 month ago

                  For now. But if you can’t imagine any scenario where an M240 would be useful, you’re very shortsighted. If (and this is a big if) we devolve into civil war, then an armed insurgency is very much on the table. All the tech stuff relies on infrastructure, and stable infrastructure is one of the first things to go.