Sanders: Trump should ‘tone it down’

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Wednesday that former President Trump should “tone it down” in an interview on MSNBC, following a post on social platform X by Trump that blamed Democratic rhetoric for political violence.

“I would suggest to Donald Trump: Tone it down. Let’s have a debate on issues, let’s have honest disagreements, but don’t start calling people terrible names or suggesting that people are communists,” Sanders said in the interview.

In Trump’s post on Monday, he wrote, “Because of this Communist Left Rhetoric, the bullets are flying, and it will only get worse!”

Trump’s post came after an apparent second assassination attempt on the former president when he was golfing in Florida on Sunday.

Trump has painted Vice President Harris as a communist and referred to her as “Comrade Kamala.”

Sanders added that political violence is “unacceptable.”

“I hope it goes without saying that everybody in American no matter what your political point of view is understands that violence of any shape or form is unacceptable in America. We have our disagreements, we don’t express them violently, end of discussion,” Sanders said.

Sanders went on to say that he views Trump’s rhetoric as “the most ugly” of any president or presidential candidate in history.

“He called Kamala Harris a ‘communist,'” Sanders added. “That is so totally absurd.”

The Hill has contacted Trump’s campaign for comment.