Responding to former President Donald Trump’s latest social media tirade, in which he said Special Counsel Jack Smith and others should “rot in Hell,” former Republican congressman of Florida David Jolly said such tantrums simply show that “the old man’s afraid of prison.”
Guest hosting MSNBC’s “The ReidOut” for Joy Reid over the holiday break, Charles Coleman Jr. began the Wednesday night segment by bringing in a panel of experts, including Jolly, to discuss Trump’s behavior on his social media platform Truth Social.
“Are we seeing someone who’s just normally unhinged, or is this more about him feeling the pressure of what’s coming and people maybe telling him the truth about what he can expect ahead?” Coleman asked.
“My takeaway is the old man’s afraid of prison, because when he gets his back against the wall, we see him lash out,” Jolly said.
Trump posted to Truth Social on Monday in a series of troubling messages, in part writing, “It’s hard to have a truly great Christmas when you have a crooked and incompetent president who wants to put his political opponent in jail, and who has been working hard (for a change!), illegally using all of the levers of law enforcement to do so.”
In a later post, he added, “Merry Christmas to all, including Crooked Joe Biden’s only hope, Deranged Jack Smith, the out of control lunatic who just hired outside attorneys, fresh from the swamp (unprecedented!) to help him with his poorly executed witch hunt against ‘Trump’ and ‘MAGA’ … MAY THEY ROT IN HELL. AGAIN, MERRY CHRISTMAS!”
Monday’s Truth Social posts from Trump marked a pattern of holiday missives for the embattled politician, following a Thanksgiving post in which he slammed New York Attorney Letitia James as “racist and incompetent.”
Chiming in on that pattern, Jolly continued.
“Much like he did on Thanksgiving, he name-checks prosecutors who in some ways are holding his freedom in jeopardy and in balance here as they’re presenting their case in front of judges,” Jolly explained. “Thanksgiving, he went after Letitia James, that has Donald Trump’s personal fortunes on the line. He’s going after Jack Smith now. I think we’re seeing Donald Trump with his back against the wall.”
He continued, saying that “there is danger in that,” and “maybe he truly has lost it.”
“We can talk about the fact that on Christmas, he writes, ‘Go to Hell.’ He also said on Christmas that he would replace Obamacare, so maybe he truly has lost it,” Jolly said. “But I think where it does give us cause for danger and concern is he is currently neck and neck with Joe Biden, some polls have him ahead. This is an indicator when he says that he is running for retribution that he will do what he says he’s going to do. What would he do today if he was in office with the power to use the Department of Justice for his own means? I think we know where his frame of mind is. We know where his intent is. If he were to achieve power again, that’s a dangerous mixture.”
The Christmas message against Smith came days after the special counsel filed a motion to “block Trump from making political arguments and discussing conspiracy theories during his criminal trial,” according to MSNBC.
Watch the full “ReidOut” segment in the video above.
