Lock horn: Biden-Harris and Trump spar over jailing opponents

TOI correspondent from Washington: Outgoing President Joe Biden sparked MAGA anger by telling Democrats: “We have to lock him up“, referring to Donald Trumpbefore quickly keying in his comment to clarify that he meant figurative rather than literal incarceration.
At a campaign event in New Hampshire, Biden said, “I know this sounds bizarre. It sounds like you’d lock me up if I said this five years ago. We need to lock him up before we clarify, “lock him up politically… lock him out,” even as the Democrats were cracking up. in applause.
The Trump campaign immediately lashed out at Biden and Harris, even though the former president first led chants of “Lock her up” during the 2016 presidential campaign when Hillary Clinton was his opponent. “Joe Biden has just admitted the truth: his and Kamala’s plan has always been to politically persecute their opponent President Trump because they cannot beat him fair and square,” Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement, adding admitted: “The Harris-Biden Admin is the real threat to democracy. We appeal to Kamala Harris to condemn Joe Biden’s disgraceful comment.” Harris made no comment.
At some of Kamala Harris’ rallies there have been chants of “Lock him up,” but she has tactfully responded by saying, “The courts will take care of that.” We will take care of November.”
Trump has recently suggested that he favors the use of government tools and the military against adversaries, speaking of the “enemy within” while lamenting the arming of the Justice Department — “lawyer” in MAGA jargon — against it. At some rallies dating back to 2016, he has explicitly suggested beating up protesters, sometimes joking that he will even foot the legal bill for those who punch protesters.
In fact, the latest flashpoint between the two camps came when John Kelly, a retired Navy general and Donald Trump’s White House chief of staff, said in several interviews that the former president “fits the common definition of fascist,” “the kind of generals that Hitler had,” and “certainly prefers the dictatorial approach to government.”
In an interview with Atlantic magazine, Kelly said Trump had wished his military would show him the same respect that Adolf Hitler’s Nazi generals showed Hitler during World War II.
“Do you mean Bismarck’s generals?” Kelly said he asked Trump and revealed that the former president did not know who Bismarck was or about the Franco-Prussian War.
“I said, ‘Do you mean the Emperor’s generals? Surely you don’t mean Hitler’s generals?’ And he said, ‘Yes, yes, Hitler’s generals,'” Kelly said, recounting a conversation that the Trump campaign said never happened.