Trump Refuses to Tell Hannity He Will Not Abuse Power if Re-Elected

Donald Trump, in a Fox News town hall Wednesday, did not rule out breaking the law if re-elected president.

In the quadruply indicted Republican frontrunner’s third Iowa town hall with Sean Hannity since June, Trump’s response to a very simple question only raised the level of alarm among those who fear he will abuse his presidential powers.

Hannity, who earlier had shown interview clips and columns from high-profile leaders warning of Trump’s authoritarian nature, asked the candidate about it.

“They want to call you a dictator. You used the words, ‘I am your retribution.’ And before that, you said if you had been ‘wronged,’ and you used other words as well. But I want to be very, very clear on this,” Hannity began.

The Fox host and Trump confidant then teed up what should have elicited an uncontroversial response from the Republican Party’s leading candidate for the highest office in the nation.

“To be clear, do you in any way have any plans whatsoever if re-elected president to abuse power, to break the law, to use the government to go after people?” he asked.

“You mean like they’re using right now” Trump responded, to some applause.

“In the history of our country, what’s happened to us, again, has never happened before. Over nonsense, over nothing—made-up charges,” he insisted, referring to the 91 felonies he is accused of, some related to his role in trying to thwart the Democratic process after his 2020 election loss.

“I often say Al Capone—he was one of the greatest of all time, if you like criminals—he was a mob boss the likes of which— ‘Scarface,’ they called him—and he got indicted once. I got indicted four times,” Trump said. “I wonder what my father and mother would say, looking down.”

Later in the sit-down, Hannity gave Trump a second chance to answer. The result, however, was Trump admitting that he would be a “dictator,” but “only on day one.”

Hannity, who claimed he wanted a straight answer because “the media” has been “attacking” him on it, asked Trump: “Under no circumstances—you are promising America, tonight—you would never abuse power as retribution against anybody?”

Trump’s response: “Except for day one. I want to close the border, and I want to drill, drill, drill,” he explained, prompting Hannity to claim that that doesn’t amount to retribution, but a policy.

“We love this guy,” Trump then said of the Fox host. “He says, ‘You’re not going to be a dictator, are you?’ I said, ‘No, no, no. Other than day one.’ We’re closing the border, and we’re drilling, drilling, drilling. After that, I’m not a dictator.”

Trump refused to go into more details and the town hall continued, with the former president moving on to Joe Biden, claiming he does not believe he will be the 2024 Democratic nominee: “I don’t think he makes it physically… mentally he’s possibly equally as bad or even worse.”

For its part, the Biden campaign—along with the Democratic National Committee—quickly drew attention to Trump’s comments.

“And there you have it,” the DNC’s rapid response team wrote on X in response to a clip that the Biden campaign posted.

The president’s campaign also sent an email to supporters with the subject line: “Donald Trump: Day One Dictator.” according to The Hill.