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President Donald Trump denounced the anti-semitic protests at Columbia University on Tuesday, taking aim at prominent Democrat officials, including Joe Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., for their aimless response to the carnage that has swept the once prestigious school.
Columbia has experienced a slew of unruly demonstrations in recent weeks to protest Israel, which has retaliated against the terrorist group Hamas for its horrific and deadly attacks on Israeli civilians.
Israel has been at war with Hamas ever since the terrorist group’s Oct. 7 attack on the Jewish state, which killed a reported 1,200 Israelis and foreigners.
“Where is Schumer? Why isn’t Schumer speaking up?” the 45th president asked Fox News’s Sean Hannity during an exclusive interview on Tuesday. “He was always out there in front—because he’s looking at votes, I guess. And I guess he’s looking maybe at more votes than [those that] represent Israel.”
Schumer is the highest-ranking senator of the nine that serve in the upper chamber.
President Trump also blasted Biden’s softened rhetoric on the protests, claiming that his opponent needs to “strengthen up” and “do something.”
“When there’s an attack, a sneak attack like an Oct. 7 that’s so violent and such hatred, you have to clean it out,” argued the president. “You have to clean out the cancer, and you have to let [the Israelis] do their job.”
He added, “The United States has to get courage, and the United States has to speak up. Nobody knows where the U.S. stands right now. I think Biden is not on the side of Israel, and he’s making a tremendous mistake. You have to clean up the terror that we witnessed on Oct. 7.”
“Biden is supposed to be the voice of our country, and is certainly not much of a voice. It’s a voice that nobody’s heard,” the president told Hannity. “I don’t think he’s able to do it. I don’t think he’s got what it takes to do it, but he’s got to. He’s got to strengthen up, and he’s got to be heard.”
President Trump also commended law enforcement during the interview, particularly how officers entered Hamilton Hall on Tuesday night to arrest a reported 109 protestors who occupied the building.
Per CBS News, protestors, including outside protestors according to Democrat New York City Mayor Eric Adams, entered the building and locked themselves inside on Tuesday. The activists smashed windows and doors to enter Hamilton Hall and then refused to leave.
Furniture was also allegedly boarded against the doors, and supplies were lifted up to protestors inside from a rope and pulley.
“I think New York City’s finest have been incredible the way they’ve been—it’s not over yet—but the way they walked in and the way they climbed through that window,” said President Trump. “They were not afraid of anything.”
The president also suggested that many protestors were “paid agitators” rather than actual students.
“I really think you have a lot of paid agitators, professional agitators in here too, and I see it all over. And you know, when you see the signs and they’re all identical, that means they’re being paid by a source,” said President Trump.
He continued, “These aren’t hand-painted signs where people would go to their basement and paint something because they really believed it. These are all signs that are identical. They’re made by the same printer.”
The 45th president concluded, “When you see that, that means there’s somebody at the top that’s paying or a group that’s paying.”