Vice President Kamala Harris took a swipe at former President Trump following last week’s conviction during a Tuesday late-night appearance, saying “cheaters” don’t like being caught.
When asked by ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel how she first learned about the verdict, Harris jokingly replied “rapidly.”
“Let’s think about this. A jury of 12 people, peers, over the course of six weeks deliberated on the evidence and facts and unanimously determined guilt [for] 34 felony counts,” Harris said. “There was a defense attorney who actively participated in selecting that jury, who actively made decisions about witnesses to call, witnesses to cross-examine. And the jury made their decision.”
“And you know, I think that the reality is cheaters don’t like getting caught and being held accountable,” Harris added.
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Later in the interview, Kimmel accused Trump of “classic projection” when it came to his accusations of the Biden administration weaponizing the Department of Justice.
“If President Biden has weaponized the justice system, why doesn’t he get his son out of the trial?” Kimmel asked Harris. “Hunter is currently on trial, couldn’t he just snap his weaponized finger and get him right out of that?”
“To your point, the former president is a hypocrite,” Harris responded, “and will apply one set of standards to himself and another to others.”
“He was born a hypocrite. I mean, he puts the ‘hippo’ in ‘hypocrite,’” Kimmel exclaimed. “What I find hard to swallow is like listen, these are not bad people, people who support him. They’re getting misinformation. But how they don’t see through this, like how they don’t look at this and go like, ‘Wait a minute, that makes no sense.’”
After initially responding by pivoting to tout Biden’s record, Harris called out what she called the “perverse” dynamic she says has taken place in American politics in recent years where “the measure of the strength of the leader is based on who you beat down instead of who you lift up.”
“The notion that is I think very backwards, to suggest it’s a sign of weakness to have empathy, to have some level of concern or care about the well-being of other people and then go about doing something to uplift their condition. That’s the track that we take. We believe that that’s the role of a leader,” Harris said during the late-night appearance.
She added, “That’s certainly how Joe Biden and I and our administration have been doing our work.”
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Last week, Trump was found guilty in New York on all 34 counts against him of falsifying business records related to a hush money payment to Stormy Daniels. His legal team vows to challenge the verdict.
Trump’s defenders have blasted the guilty verdict, accusing Democrats of using “lawfare” to try to defeat him in the election.