USA | Trump says he will end moratorium on federal executions on his first day in office, and use full force of the law to go after major drug dealers and cop killers

Trump sat down with DailyMail.com for an interview at his Mar-a-Lago home. He talked about the campaign and his plans for day one in the White House.

Donald Trump says he will end the Justice Department moratorium on executions on his first day in office, and use the full force of the law to go after major drug dealers and cop killers.

The Trump campaign sees crime, in general, and Kamala Harris's record as a prosecutor in California, in particular, as areas where they can inflict damage on her presidential bid.

And in an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, Trump laid out more details of his crime-fighting agenda starting with whether he would reverse the Biden-Harris administration's freeze on federal executions.

'Of course I would. I would have executions on major drug dealers,' he said when asked if it would be a day-one priority.

'I would have, perhaps, the raping of a child, the killing of a police officer.

'I would have executions on the people that violently kill people.'

Trump's administration restored the use of the federal death penalty in 2019. And 13 federal death row inmates were executed, before Biden's Attorney General Merrick Garland announced a halt in July 2021.

Some 27 states have the death penalty on their books, although seven have also suspended executions.

Trump has brought up the theme of tougher penalties for a range of crimes on the campaign trail to portray himself as the candidate of law and order.

Last week he was at the border with Mexico where he highlighted the damage done by cartels and smugglers, and met with grieving mothers..

'We have people coming into this country. I just left a number of them last week, as you saw. at the border, where their daughters were killed, their sons were killed' he said.

'Their sons were killed by thugs and migrants coming into our country, and they viciously ... they were viciously and violently killed and stuffed into garbage cans.'

Drug dealers responsible for hundreds of deaths should also face the ultimate sanction, he said.

'The average drug dealer kills 500 people during that person's lifetime. I would have no problem with that. If you're going to stop the drug epidemic, you're going to have to have a death penalty,' he added.

Trump has used rallies and speeches to attack his election opponent, who rose from the San Francisco district attorney's office to become California attorney general, as soft on crime.

Last week, at a Michigan sheriff's office, he called her a police 'defunder' and a pro-crime 'Marxist prosecutor.'

'We’re here today to talk about how we are going to stop the Kamala crime wave that is going on at levels that nobody’s ever seen before,' he said last Tuesday.

'She is, as you know, the most radical left person ever even thought of for a high office.'

For its part, the Harris campaign has shrugged off his attacks, painting the contest as a former prosecutor against a '34-time convicted felon,' in a reference to the New York hush money case in which Trump was found guilty on all counts.

And it accused him of lying 'about crime, which skyrocketed on his watch, about policing, which he tried to defund, and about the January 6 insurrectionists who attacked police officers defending our Capitol at his behest.

'Donald Trump can’t bring us together so he tries to drive us apart. The American people will reject his failed leadership and divisive agenda this November.'

Harris has enjoyed a bump in her poll and fundraising numbers since she became the Democratic nominee for president.

But Trump said he had won a string of key endorsements and felt his campaign had gone from strength to strength.

During the interview, in the gilded splendor living room of Mar-a-Lago—the club's most lavish reception room—also slammed Harris for waiting so long to give an interview, and laid out his unease with Florida's strict abortion law.

This issue is a tricky one for Trump as he tried to keep his evangelical supporters on board without alienating women voters.

He has tried to keep all sides happy by saying abortion is an issue for states to decide. But Florida, where he lives, is holding a referendum on expanding access to abortion from its newly enacted six-week limit. He said he had made up his mind on the issue.

'Well, I do know, but I do want more than six weeks,' he said. 'I want more than six weeks.

'I think six weeks is a mistake. And I'll be expressing that soon, but I want more than six weeks.

'And in Florida, we have a six-week program, and that's what I believe that you're voting on, and I think it should be more than six weeks.'

Source: Mail Online, Rob Crilly, August 30, 2024

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