'No more love letters to Kim Jong Un': Raskin slams Trump's past praise for communist dictators

Most people settle for a congratulatory message on July 4, but not Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), who offered President Donald Trump some pointed advice on how to pursue his new anti-communist campaign effectively. "... not sending any more love letters to Kim Jong Un, the 'top of the line' Communist dictator of North Korea with whom he has 'great chemistry'; not lavishing praise on President Xi, the 'top of the line, brilliant' Communist dictator of China," he wrote on X.

The 63-year-old, who is a ranking member on the House Oversight Committee and the Judiciary Committee, also included Russian President Vladimir Putin for good measure: "...not serving dictator Vladimir Putin, former head of the KGB, by calling him 'very smart' and his bloody imperialist moves against Ukraine 'genius' and by bolstering Putin's campaign against our democratic allies in NATO. Anticommunism is easy, Mr President, when you start defending human rights and stop fawning over Communist tyrants!"

The Maryland Democrat's comments come in the wake of Trump invoking the specter of communism in his Independence Day speeches. The 80-year-old dedicated a significant chunk of his speech on the eve of Independence Day at Mount Rushmore to highlighting the threat of communism to the American way of life. "Communism is a mortal threat to American liberty. It is the greatest threat to our country, including World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor, or even 9/11," he averred.

The president may not have mentioned names explicitly, but he appears to be referring to a spate of wins by Democratic Socialists in recent primaries across New York and Colorado. He contended that you can either be loyal to Karl Marx or America. "You can be a communist, or you can be a patriot. You cannot be both. Even while the radicals and extremists attack our incredible history at every turn, they are silent on the miserable history of communism itself because it never worked."

Trump then picked up from where he left off on July 3 in his speech at the 'Salute to America' event the next day. "America will never be a communist country. The communist system is the opposite of the American system. Our warriors did not fight communism on battlefields across the world only to have that menace rear its ugly head right back here in America. We’re not going to let it happen. We like to stop a threat like that immediately and before it begins. It’s like a cancer. You've got to cut it out fast, " he declared.