Democratic Rep. Debbie Dingell (Mich.) dug into former President Trump’s Christmas message calling for various people he sees as “looking to destroy” the country to “rot in hell,” calling it “one of the most pathetic” Christmas greetings she has heard.
Asked on CNN if things are getting worse in terms of threats against public servants, Dingell on Tuesday said, “They’re deteriorating and they’re getting worse … Quite frankly, I’m going to tell you that I think it was one of the most pathetic Christmas greetings I’ve heard when a former president of the United States who wants to return tells people on Christmas Day that they ‘can rot in hell.'”
In the message on Truth Social, Trump went after public figures including world leaders and special counsel Jack Smith, who is overseeing the Justice Department’s investigation into the former president’s actions surrounding the 2020 election and Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection.
“Merry Christmas to all, including Crooked Joe Biden’s ONLY HOPE, Deranged Jack Smith,” Trump wrote in the post. He has often called Smith “deranged” and has repeatedly accused the special counsel of working to further what he characterizes as President Biden’s “political agenda.”
“Included also are World Leaders, both good and bad, but none of which are as evil and ‘sick’ as the THUGS we have inside our Country who, with their Open Borders, INFLATION, Afghanistan Surrender, Green New Scam, High Taxes, No Energy Independence, Woke Military, Russia/Ukraine, Israel/Iran, All Electric Car Lunacy, and so much more, are looking to destroy our once great USA. MAY THEY ROT IN HELL. AGAIN, MERRY CHRISTMAS!” Trump continued.
Dingell said Trump is “contributing to the divisiveness [and] division” in the nation, a nod to her tension with the former president in recent years.
In 2019, Trump insulted Dingell and her late husband, former Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), drawing the ire of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Trump dug into Dingell for voting for his impeachment and suggested her late husband, who was the longest-serving member of Congress in history when he died that February, was “looking up” from hell.
“Yes, I have had people, and after he went after me, and quite frankly, there were men outside of my house with assault weapons, and I have had threats, but it is hate and division [that] are creeping into our communities far too easily,” Dingell said Tuesday. “Violence is becoming normalized. Every last one of us has to stand up. We can disagree civilly; we need to respect every human being with dignity.”
“We need to treat them like everybody’s a human being and bring that civility back because our democracy is in trouble if we start to let the kind of anger, violence and division that’s creeping in be normalized more,” she continued.
Trump continues to maintain a strong lead in the GOP presidential primary. According to The Hill and Decision Desk HQ’s aggregation of polls, Trump holds a 52.4 point lead in GOP primary polling and a 3 point lead over President Biden in a hypothetical rematch between the two rivals.