Politics

Reid DOUBLES DOWN: Bundy supporters ‘domestic, violent terrorist wannabes’ [VIDEO]

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Brendan Bordelon Contributor
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Nevada Democratic Sen. Harry Reid refused to back down from his inflammatory branding of Cliven Bundy supporters as “domestic terrorists,” calling people who turned out to support the rancher “domestic, violent terrorist wannabes” on Friday and sparring with his Republican counterpart who labelled them “patriots.”

Reid took hits from many sides yesterday for his controversial comments — including from Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul, who called on Reid to “calm the rhetoric” or risk inciting real violence (RELATED: After ‘domestic terrorist’ remark, Rand Paul urges Harry Reid to ‘calm the rhetoric’ on Cliven Bundy).

But instead of cooling it, Reid doubled down during an appearance with Nevada Republican Senator Dean Heller on “What’s Your Point,” a local Las Vegas news program.

“Bundy doesn’t believe that the American government is valid, he believes the United States is a foreign government,” Reid claimed. “He doesn’t pay his taxes, he doesn’t follow the law. He doesn’t pay his fees.”

“And if anyone thinks by any figment of their imagination that what happened up there last week was, people rallying to somebody that was oppressed,” he continued, “600 people came in, armed. They had practiced, they had maneuvered. They knew what they were doing.”

He noted that some of the protesters had set up firing positions opposite Bureau of Land Management agents, who had been menacing unarmed Americans with high-grade military weaponry for days.

“If there were ever an example of people who were domestic, violent terrorist wannabes, these are the guys,” he declared.

“But no one called Bundy a domestic terrorist,” Reid also hastened to add. “I said the people that came there were.”

Heller had a very different interpretation. “What Sen. Reid may call domestic terrorists, I call patriots,” he asserted.

Reid hit back: “If these people think they’re patriots, they’re not,” he said. “I use that word typically. But if they’re patriots, we’re in big trouble.”

“Well it’s a pretty broad brush,” Heller countered. “Pretty broad brush when you have Boy Scouts there. You have veterans at the event. You have grandparents at the event.”

“I take more issue at the BLM coming in with a paramilitary army than individuals with snipers,” the Republican lawmaker. “And I’m talking to people and groups that were there at the event. And having your own government with sniper lenses on you, it made a lot of people very uncomfortable.”

“There was no army!” Reid replied. “And that land — 300,000 acres, federal land — has been basically decimated by this guy.”

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