President Donald Trump called vice presidential nominee Sen. Kamala Harris a 'monster' following Wednesday's vice presidential debate, and also labeled Mike Pence's counterpart on stage a 'communist.'
The president made the personal and ideological attack on Harris, the third woman to earn the second slot on a major party ticket, hours after she used the debate to blast Trump for his handling of the coronavirus and other issues.
'And this monster that was on stage with Mike Pence – who destroyed her last night by the way,' Trump said, when asked a general question about his review of the debate.
President Donald Trump referred to Sen. Kamala Harris 'this monster that was on stage with Mike Pence.' He also called the Democratic VP nominee 'unlikeable'
'But this monster, she says no, no there won’t be fracking. There won’t be this. There won’t – everything she said is a lie,' he said of the California senator.
He went after Harris after predicting without evidence that 'Biden won’t be president for two months.'
'He’s not mentally capable of being president ... He can’t be president,' said Trump.
Trump gave the interview by phone from the White House, where he is battling the coronavirus, but claimed he is cured. He was speaking to Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo.
Trump made the attacks on Harris as he struggles to make up ground against Biden among female voters. Biden led Trump by a stunning 23 points in a Washington Post / ABC News poll released Sept. 29.
His attack and ideological smear came despite Pence making a point of acknowledging on stage her historic spot on the ticket.
'And senator, I want to thank you and Joe Biden for your expressions of genuine concern. And I also want to congratulate you as I did on that phone call on the historic nation of your nomination,' he said, thanking her for earlier comments about Trump's health.
After leveling the communist charge – which in the 1950s and 60s carried both stigma and danger of prosecution – Trump accused the Biden-Harris ticket of walking away from commitments to left-wing lawmakers.
Harris, referring to Trump's millions in debt, said the American people deserve to know to whom the president owes money, and blasted Trump for paying just $750 in taxes on his 2019 federal income tax return
Donald Trump went after Harris in a call-in interview with Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo
Trump also pronounced Harris 'totally unlikeable'
'Take a look at the manifesto. They agreed to that with Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio- plus three I call it, you know all the killers. They agreed to it,' Trump said.
'They agreed to the manifesto. Open borders, crime pouring into our country. They want to have thousands of people that are murders, rapists just pour into our country. They could be very sick people,' said Trump.
Trump was following up on a charge by Pence on stage: that Biden would end fracking. Harris said he would not. He also pronounced Harris 'totally unlikeable.'
'I thought that wasn’t even a contest last night. She was terrible. She was, I don’t think you can get worse. And totally unlikeable. And she is. She’s a communist. She’s left of Bernie. She’s rated left of Bernie by everybody. She’s a communist. Are we going to have a communist?' he said.
'No, she’s a communist. She’s well beyond a socialist. Take a look at her views. She wants to open up the borders to allow killers and murders and rapists to pour into our country,' Trump repeated.
Harris is a former prosecutor who while she was a presidential candidate endorsed the 'green new deal,' which Biden has not done. According to her 2019 tax returns released by the Biden campaign, Harris and her husband Douglas Emhoff, a prominent California lawyer, paid $1.2 million in taxes.
