Dr. Phil’s sit down with Donald Trump got a little weird on Tuesday night.
The TV doctor, who’s infamously not been a licensed psychologist since 2006, asked Trump if he thought Kamala Harris and Joe Biden were “OK” with him being shot.
“I’m not saying that they wanted you to get shot, but do you think it was OK with them if you did?” he asked.
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Trump responded by saying “I don’t know” twice before adding, “There’s a lot of hatred. I don’t know why.” He went on to boast about his presidency’s achievements, claiming those successes created a hatred among Democrats that meant some wanted to see him assassinated.
Elsewhere in the interview, Trump spoke even more pointedly against Harris and Biden, alleging they directly had a hand in Thomas Matthew Crooks’ attempt on his life. He’d previously posted online that the “Biden/Harris administration did not properly protect” him, but his interview escalated his claims a step further.
“When this happened, people would ask, whose fault is it?” Trump said. “I think to a certain extent it’s Biden’s fault and Harris’ fault... Look, they were weaponizing government against me, they brought in the whole DOJ to try and get me, they weren’t too interested in my health and safety.”
Trump later added, “They were making it very difficult to have proper staffing in terms of Secret Service.” He offered no evidence to support this claim.
Secret Service agents rushed to shield Donald Trump on stage after shots rang out.
Brendan McDermid/ReutersBiden and Harris immediately condemned the attempt on Trump’s life on July 13. The U.S. Secret Service has been under intense scrutiny since the shooting, with its director resigning and other agents placed on leave.
The FBI said it still doesn’t know definitively why Crooks, a 20-year-old nursing home worker who lived with his parents, tried to assassinate Trump. Some Google searches suggested he was itching to kill someone prominent, with him having sought information on public appearances for Biden, Trump, and other top U.S. government officials.
On Tuesday, however, Trump suggested that it was Democrats’ rhetoric that nearly got him killed.
“They’re saying I’m a threat to democracy,” Trump said. “They would say that, that was standard line, just keep saying it, and you know that can get assassins or potential assassins going. That’s a terrible thing… Maybe that bullet is because of their rhetoric.”
An aerial view shows the stage where Donald Trump was shot and the building his attempted assassin, Thomas Matthew Crooks, fired from.
Brendan McDermid/ReutersTrump added that he “took a bullet” for the country, again recalling how grateful he was that he turned his head to the right just as Crooks’ first bullet reached him.
Trump, 78, also spoke about why he thinks divine intervention saved his life, saying, “God loves our country and he thinks we’re going to bring our country back. He wants to bring it back.”
Trump even evoked Jesus’ name while discussing his 2020 election loss, bizarrely claiming that he would’ve won deep-blue California had his votes just been counted correctly.
“If Jesus Christ came down and was the vote counter, I would win California, OK?” Trump said. “In other words, if we had an honest vote counter, a really honest vote counter—I do great with Hispanics, great, I mean at a level no Republican has ever done—but if we had an honest vote counter, I would win California.”
Trump has also assailed Harris for not sitting down for an interview but has himself been spending time with conservative podcasters and non-network television.
