House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi pointed to Donald Trump's violent comments about shooting at journalists as evidence “of his cognitive degeneration” and doubted the former president's ability to “last as president for four years with his brain deteriorating at the rate that it is.”
Pelosi was reacting to remarks Trump made at a Pennsylvania rally Sunday morning when he said that because of the way the rally was set up, if someone made an assassination attempt “to get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news, and I don't mind that so much.”
“I think what the ex-president just said is further indication of his cognitive degeneration,” Pelosi said on MSNBC during an interview with Jen Psaki. “You saw recently how he was talking about whether he chose electrocution or being eaten by sharks. Something's very wrong there. And it also is diminishing the power of the press, which is the guardian of our freedom in our country.”
Pelosi continued, “So, I think people who might [be] thinking about voting for him have to know that he can't last as president for four years with his brain deteriorating at the rate that it is, and is clearly evident. And they may be voting for President Vance, which would be a horrible thing for our country.”
Psaki asked Pelosi about Trump's recent comments that he wants to see former Rep. Liz Cheney in front of a firing squad: “Do you think he knows that he's potentially inciting violence against her, violence against you, violence against others who he… threatens publicly ?”
“Well, it does have a chilling effect on people who may want to run for office to think that they may be endangering themselves or more importantly their families,” Pelosi said. She added, “For Liz Cheney, you'd think that would be so dispositive of people's votes. But there are some people who only vote by the fact they're very wealthy, and they don't want to pay taxes… That's really sad that they pledge allegiance to their tax return and not to our country and our constitution.”
The speaker emerita also commented on the violence that was visited upon her family when a man armed with a hammer attacked her husband, Paul, in their San Francisco home in 2022, leaving him with a head injury that required brain surgery. This past May, the attacker was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
“Coming into our house, violating the sanctity of our home, the safety of my husband, looking for me, echoing what was said on January 6 in the Capitol: 'Where's Nancy? Where's Nancy?'” she said. “[The attacker] was coming up to punish me for what I had said about Donald Trump.”
After the attack, Trump publicly pushed an unfounded conspiracy theory that the attack was staged and, according to Rolling Stone's reporting, privately claimed the attack was “fake.”
Trump two weeks ago named Pelosi as part of “the enemy within” and in comments earlier in October said that the “enemy from within… should be very easily handled, if necessary, by the National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military .”
