CLEVELAND, July 20 (UPI) — An adviser to GOP nominee Donald Trump now has the attention of the U.S. Secret Service, for inflammatory remarks he made on a Boston radio show this week, in which he said Hillary Clinton should be killed for treason.
Republican Al Baldasaro, a New Hampshire state lawmaker who serves as the Trump campaign’s co-chair on veterans affairs, told WRKO Tuesday that the Democratic candidate’s handling of security concerns in the run-up to the Benghazi terrorist attack in 2012, and her use of a private email server are treasonous activities — which are punishable under U.S. law by death.
“She is a disgrace … for the lies that she told those mothers about their children that got killed over there in Benghazi,” Baldasaro said of Clinton. “She dropped the ball on over 400 emails requesting back-up security. Something’s wrong there.”
“This whole thing disgusts me,” the retired Marine first sergeant continued. “Hillary Clinton should be put in the firing line and shot for treason.”
The Boston Globe reached Baldasaro for comment on Wednesday and reported that the 59-year-old Trump aide stands by his remarks, “without a doubt.”
“When you take classified information on a server that deals with where our State Department, Special Forces, CIA, whatever in other countries, that’s a death sentence for those people if that information gets in the hands of other countries or the terrorists,” Baldasaro said. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s information for the enemy. In the military, shot, firing squad. So I stand by what I said.”
The U.S. Constitution defines treason as “waging war” against the United States or “adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort.”
A Clinton campaign spokeswoman faulted Trump for running a campaign where “dangerous” rhetoric is permitted.
“His constant escalation of outrageous rhetoric is in danger of mainstreaming the kind of hatred that has long been relegated to the fringes of American politics where it belongs,” the spokeswoman told the Globe. “This week at the Republican convention, we’ve seen the clearest embodiment yet of this dangerous phenomenon.”
The Secret Service said in a statement that it was aware of Baldasaro’s remarks and would “conduct the appropriate investigation.”
Clinton didn’t directly address Baldasaro’s remarks Wednesday, but she continued to criticize the Trump campaign for what she called its “hateful” rhetoric.
“What our president says matters,” she tweeted. “We can’t let Donald Trump’s hateful words speak for us.”
