GREENVILLE: Former US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that Alexei Navalny was a “very brave man” who probably should not have returned to Russia, without assigning any blame for the unexpected death of the Russian opposition leader.
Democratic President Joe Biden and other Western leaders have blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for Navalny’s death, as has Nikki Haley, who trails Trump as the only remaining contender for the Republican presidential nomination.
“Navalny is a very sad situation and he is very brave, he was very brave because he came back. He could have stayed away,” Trump said during a town hall interview with Fox News in South Carolina.
“And frankly, it probably would have been a lot better for him to stay away and speak from abroad than to have to come back in because people thought it might happen, and it did.” And that’s a terrible thing,” he said.
The Kremlin has denied involvement in Navalny’s death and said Western claims that Putin was responsible were unacceptable.
Trump — who has expressed admiration for Putin both during and after his 2017-2021 White House tenure — has continued to draw comparisons to Navalny, suggesting both faced politically motivated prosecutions.
“But this is happening in our country as well,” Trump said. “In many ways we are turning into a communist country. And if you look at it – I’m a prime candidate. I am accused.”
In a Truth Social post on Sunday, Trump wrote that Navalny’s death last week in an Arctic penal colony made him “more aware of what’s going on” in the United States. Trump has not elaborated, but has often dismissed the 91 criminal charges against him as politically motivated, which prosecutors deny.
On Tuesday, Biden issued a blistering criticism of Trump’s social media platform Truth Social over Navalny’s death, saying: “Why does Trump always blame America? Putin is responsible for Navalny’s death. Why can’t Trump just say that?”
During a Fox News town hall held in front of a live audience in Greenville four days before the state primary, Trump continued to blast migrants, portraying them as a threat to public safety without offering any evidence to support his claims that there are more. more violent than native americans.
At several points, the 77-year-old Trump’s answers to questions veered off-topic.
While being asked about electric vehicles and the “freedom of movement of Americans,” Trump talked about the usefulness of tariffs and described his interactions with an unnamed American dishwashing company during his time in office.
Also read: US lawmakers hopeful of pause in Gaza war before Ramadan
Trump praised South Carolina US Senator Tim Scott, who joined Trump on stage for the final part of the interview. The former president privately asked aides about naming Scott, a former rival in the Republican nomination battle, as his running mate, sources familiar with the matter previously said.
The association with Scott may have short-term electoral benefits for the former president in the South Carolina primary as voters choose who they want as the Republican nominee to take on Biden in the Nov. 5 election.
Trump leads Haley, a former South Carolina governor and Trump’s former ambassador to the United Nations, by more than 30 percentage points in South Carolina, according to most polls, and his team is eager to deliver a crushing blow. However, Haley said there was no way she could drop out and that she planned to continue campaigning until March.
