President Biden defended himself by saying it was “time to put Trump on the spot” just days after the attempted assassination of the former president and attempted to explain what he meant amid calls for politicians to tone down their rhetoric.
Biden sat down with NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt for an exclusive interview where he was asked about his remarks before the shooting on a July 8 donor call.
“You said it was time to put Trump in the spotlight. There’s some controversy about the context, but you know words matter,” Holt said.
“I didn’t say ‘focus’,” Biden replied. “I was talking about focusing on something.”
“Look, the truth of the matter is, I guess what I was talking about at the time, there was very little focus on the Trump agenda,” Biden continued.
When Holt pointed out that the term was bullseye, not crosshairs, Biden said “it was a mistake to use the word: I didn’t say crosshairs, I meant bullseye, I meant focus on him.”
President Biden defends saying it’s time to put Trump “on target,” saying he meant to “focus on him.”
Biden said what he meant was “focus on what you’re doing, focus on your policies.”
The president then attacked Trump, including the “lies he told in the debate” and said there is a whole range of things.
“I’m not the guy who said he wanted to be a dictator on day one. I’m not the guy who refused to accept the outcome of the election,” Biden said.
The president was asked if he had done any kind of “examination of conscience” about the things he had said that could incite people “who are not balanced.”
The president paused for a moment before responding.
“Look, how do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real, when a president says things like he says?” Biden asked. “You don’t say anything because you might incite someone?”
The clip of Biden’s response was released Monday afternoon ahead of the full interview. It comes as the president prepares to return to the campaign trail this week following the shooting at Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where a bullet grazed the former president’s ear.
Biden immediately condemned the shooting after it happened, calling it “sickening.”
He has sought to calm the anxiety and anger that has permeated the election cycle following the assassination attempt. Some Republicans have blamed Democrats and the president’s rhetoric in the aftermath of the shooting.
On Sunday, the president delivered a speech from the Oval Office in which he called for an end to political violence and noted that both Democrats and Republicans have been targeted.
“You know the political rhetoric in this country has gotten very heated. It’s time to cool it down,” Biden said. “Politics should never be a literal battlefield; God forbid it be a killing field.”
Donald Trump arrived in Milwaukee for the Republican convention on Sunday, a day after the assassination attempt.
Biden said in his interview with Holt that he has not engaged in such rhetoric.
“Now my opponent has resorted to that rhetoric,” Biden told NBC News. He noted that Trump said there would be a “bloodbath” if he lost and claimed he would suspend the sentences of the Jan. 6 rioters.
The president also criticized Trump for joking about the hammer attack on Speaker Emeritus Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul.
The criticism comes as Biden returns to the campaign trail this week.
Biden was originally scheduled to be in Austin, Texas, on Monday when the Republican National Convention began in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, but his campaign canceled the trip after the shooting.
Biden now heads to Las Vegas, where he will spend two days speaking to Black and Latino voters as he struggles to restart his campaign following the horrific attack on his political rival.