Joe Biden issued a chilling threat on Tuesday, openly calling for Donald Trump to be "locked up" just 14 days before Election Day.
With his blunt message, Biden stepped on his party's closing argument that Trump is a dangerous "fascist" who wants to jail his political enemies.
Trump, who was indicted four separate times by Democratic prosecutors after launching his 2024 campaign, has long argued that Democrats are the ones threatening democracy by weaponizing government.
Democrats have denied that Trump's multiple cases are politically motivated, but Biden was singing a different tune in New Hampshire on Tuesday.
“If I said this five years ago, you’d lock me up: We gotta lock him up,” Biden said of Trump.
After a short pause, Biden attempted to clean up his remarks, clumsily adding that Trump should be locked up "politically."
At a separate event last week, Biden taunted Trump over his upcoming criminal sentencing in his "hush money" trial, his only criminal case to reach a verdict.
Biden asserted that Trump is only running for president to "stay out of jail" as Biden admitted he is eager to watch Trump's sentencing on Nov. 26.
Biden's blatantly authoritarian messaging comes even as Democrats attempt to label Trump a "fascist" dictator in the home stretch before Election Day - as Democrats fret that the race is slipping away from Harris.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Wednesday that Biden believes Trump is a "fascist," shortly after Harris tied Trump to Hitler in a campaign speech seizing on a hit piece in far-left magazine the Atlantic.
Democrats are keenly aware that Trump may never see the inside of a jail cell if he wins the presidency. Most of Trump's legal cases are in limbo, including his federal January 6th trial.
The delays have not stopped the DOJ from attempting to tip the scales. The Special Counsel in Trump's J6 case, Jack Smith, has faced criticism for releasing allegations against Trump just weeks before Election Day.
“Joe Biden just admitted the truth: he and Kamala’s plan all along has been to politically persecute their opponent President Trump because they can’t beat him fair and square,” Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
“The Harris-Biden Admin is the real threat to democracy. We call on Kamala Harris to condemn Joe Biden’s disgraceful remark.”
