‘I’m not the guy that refused to accept the outcome of the election’

In a new interview with NBC News anchor Lester Holt on Monday, President Joe Biden defended his language in the lead-up to Saturday’s assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, saying his rival’s rhetoric is the real problem.

Some Trump allies have alleged Biden and other Democrats fomented hostility toward Trump that they claim contributed to the shooting, including Biden’s telling donors on a private call recently that it is “time to put Trump in a bull’s-eye.”

To see more of the interview, watch “NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt” tonight at 6:30 p.m. ET/5:30 p.m. CT. or check your local listings.

Biden said it was a “mistake” to use the word, but he dismissed the larger criticism, telling Holt it was merely a figure of speech and saying Trump is the one who has mainstreamed violent rhetoric. 

“I didn’t say ‘crosshairs.’ I meant ‘bull’s-eye.’ I meant focus on him. Focus on what he’s doing, focus on his policies, focus on the number of lies he told in the debate. Focus on — I mean there is a whole range of things that, look, I am not the guy that said I want to be a dictator on day one, I am not the guy that refused to accept the outcome of the election. I am not the guy who said that he won’t accept the outcome of this election automatically. You can’t only love your country when you win. And so the focus was on what he’s saying, and I mean the idea.”

Asked whether he has done “some soul searching” since the assassination attempt about any rhetoric that might unintentionally incite someone to violence, Biden said the threat from his opponent is too stark to ignore.

“How do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real, when the president says things like he says? Do you just not say something because it may incite somebody?” Biden asked rhetorically.

“I have not engaged in that rhetoric,” Biden continued. “My opponent has engaged in that rhetoric.”

It’s a different tone than the one he struck Sunday evening in an Oval Office address, when he called on all Americans to “lower the temperature” of political rhetoric and to work together to stop viewing political opponents as enemies.