GOP Rep. Jim Jordan says he can’t comment on Trump’s message threatening violence because he’s unable to read it without his glasses
Jim Jordan said he could not comment on Trump’s statement that there could be “death” and “destruction” if charged.
Jordan initially said he hadn’t read Trump’s Truth Social message.
When a reporter showed him the post, Jordan said he couldn’t read well without his glasses.
Republican Representative Jim Jordan, one of Donald Trump’s staunchest supporters on Capitol Hill, said Friday he could not comment on Trump’s recent social media post that there could be “death and “destruction” if charged in New York.
Sahil Kapur of NBC News reported that he asked Jordan what he thought of Trump’s warning, but Jordan said he hadn’t seen the former president’s Truth Social message. Kapur added that when he showed Jordan Trump’s message, the Ohio congressman replied that he couldn’t read it well without his glasses.
The former president took to his Twitter website early Friday and said that if charged by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, it would result in “potential death and destruction” and would be “catastrophic to our country”.
It was the third time in recent days that Trump had hinted at the possibility of political unrest and violence; he previously urged his base to ‘protest’ and ‘take back our nation’ and later scoffed at calls for his supporters to remain ‘peaceful’.
Jordan, meanwhile, has a long history of going to bat for Trump and is one of three Republican committee chairmen who have demanded documents and testimony from Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg as Bragg’s office appears to be closing in. to bring criminal charges against Trump.
If Trump is indicted, the case will center on an illegal $130,000 payment Michael Cohen, then Trump’s lawyer, paid to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election in exchange for her silence on an alleged affair with Trump.
Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to multiple counts — including tax evasion, bank fraud and campaign finance violations — related to the payment following a separate criminal investigation by the prosecutor’s office. Manhattan American.
Cohen said he made the payment at Trump’s direction. Trump has denied knowledge of the payment and denies the matter. He and his lawyers have also accused Bragg of trying to file a politically motivated lawsuit against the former president.
Earlier this week, Jordan and two other House Republicans sent Bragg a letter asking him to testify about the ongoing Trump investigation and calling the probe “an unprecedented abuse of prosecutorial power.”
Bragg responded Thursday in a letter in which he rejected the GOP lawmakers’ demands and described them as “an unprecedented investigation into an ongoing local lawsuit.”
Jordan told NBC’s Kapur on Friday that he is currently reviewing Bragg’s letter.
Insider contacted a spokesperson for Jordan.
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