National Guard speech: Trump says the US has “never been so close to World War III”
Trump made these remarks before a crowd of National Guard officers.
Speaking at the National Guard Association of the United States’ annual business meeting in Detroit on Monday, former President Donald Trump told a crowd of National Guard officers that the world is facing unprecedented dangers and positioned himself as one uniquely able to deter what he believes are threats to the United States.
“I don’t think we’ve ever been closer to World War III than we are right now,” Trump said. He told the audience that serving as commander in chief of the U.S. armed forces had been the greatest honor of his life and called his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, a proponent of “endless war” – the same day Harris backed President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from Afghanistan.
Trump said that if elected, he would end the war in Ukraine that broke out after the Russian invasion. He was the only candidate in the race who could make that commitment. Trump also promised to get higher payments from NATO countries. He said the US was losing too much money on the defense of Europe and called the current payments from NATO countries the “theft of the century.”
Trump also referred to threats he sees domestically to the U.S., repeating previous claims that his political opponents have used the government as a weapon to imprison their opponents, an apparent reference to his 34 felony convictions and the pending criminal cases against him. He reiterated his promise to seal off the U.S. southern border and referred to illegal crossings into the country as an “invasion.”
Reacting to his speech, Ammar Moussa, director of crisis response at Harris for President, said: “We cannot rely on Trump to keep us safe, but Vice President Harris is a proven leader on the world stage and will use her expertise to keep America safe, defeat our adversaries, and stand with our allies around the world.”
Trump’s visit to the Motor City is his seventh visit to Michigan this year. In the swing state, he faces a neck-and-neck race with Democratic presidential candidate Harris. According to a poll average from the website 538, Harris has a lead of almost three percentage points over Trump in the state since Monday.
Trump last held a campaign rally in Michigan late last month in Grand Rapids – the first since an assassination attempt on him. Since then, Trump and his running mate, U.S. Senator JD Vance of Ohio, have held smaller events in Michigan with police.
One of Trump’s biggest celebrity supporters – musician Kid Rock – wore a red “Keep America Great” hat at his launch. And former Democrat and Trump ally Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii also took the stage on Monday to support Trump.
The venue for Trump’s speech, Huntington Place, is the same convention hall where four years ago his supporters pounded on the windows outside the room where Detroit election workers were counting the absentee ballots of the city’s voters, demanding that the vote count be stopped. Trump’s supporters have begun mobilizing again this year to serve as poll workers and challenge candidates.
After his speech in Detroit, Trump made a brief stop at his campaign office in Roseville, Macomb County, where volunteers greeted him with applause and supporters lined the street chanting his name.
“We had a great race in 2016, but in 2020 we did even better, think about it,” he told the small crowd inside, despite his defeat four years ago. This year, he said, he sees even more enthusiasm for his candidacy.
He questioned the legitimacy of Harris’ late entry into the race after she formally accepted her party’s nomination at the Democratic convention in Chicago last week. He did not respond to a loud question from the Free Press about whether he would accept the outcome of the upcoming election.
While he railed against Harris using the same lines of attack he has tried to develop against his new opponent since she entered the race, he fell back on a familiar promise: “We will make America greater than it has ever been before,” Trump said.
He encouraged his volunteers to enjoy the campaign pizza and not only promised to come back, but also said the whole group could come to Mar-a-Lago if he won in November.
Before traveling to Michigan on Monday, Trump attended a wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia that morning. The memorial day marked the third anniversary of a terrorist attack outside Kabul airport that killed 13 U.S. troops and over 100 Afghan civilians. Trump sought on Monday to link Harris to Biden’s handling of the chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal, but it is unclear how Harris as vice president might have influenced Biden’s strategy.
Trump said Harris and Biden had caused the “humiliation in Afghanistan” and said the withdrawal threatened the US’s credibility in the world.
In a statement of condolences for the American soldiers killed in the terrorist attack three years ago, Harris expressed her support for Biden’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan. “As I have said before, President Biden has made the bold and right decision to end America’s longest war. Over the past three years, our administration has proven that we can take out terrorists, including the leader of al-Qaeda and ISIS, in combat zones without troops. I will never hesitate to take any action necessary to counter terrorist threats and protect the American people and the homeland,” Harris said.
Biden addressed the National Guard officers virtually at Monday’s rally and thanked them for their service in a video. “Simply put, we owe you,” he said. Biden ended his campaign against Trump earlier this summer and endorsed Harris as his successor after a disastrous debate performance, prompting Democrats to call for Biden to drop out of the race. The last-minute restructuring of the presidential campaign has forced the Trump team to adjust to its new opponent.
Contact Clara Hendrickson: [email protected] or 313-296-5743. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, @clarajanehen.
