US President Donald Trump on Monday suggested many Americans would like a dictator as he signed orders to tighten his federal clampdown on the capital Washington and to prosecute flag-burners.
During a rambling 80-minute event in the Oval Office, Trump lambasted critics and the media as he complained that he was not getting credit for his National Guard-backed crackdown on crime and immigration.
"They say 'we don't need him. Freedom, freedom. He's a dictator. He's a dictator.' A lot of people are saying: 'Maybe we like a dictator,'" Trump told reporters.
"I don't like a dictator. I'm not a dictator. I'm a man with great common sense and a smart person."
Trump, who attempted to overturn the results of his 2020 election defeat by Joe Biden at the end of his first term, said before winning a second term in November that he would be a "dictator on day one."
Republican Trump deployed the National Guard to Washington earlier this month to counter what he alleged was an out-of-control crime problem, also taking federal control of the city's police department.
Trump said he was also considering sending the military into the cities of Chicago and Baltimore as he targets a series of Democratic strongholds.
He sent the National Guard to Los Angeles -- against the mayor's and California governor's wishes -- in June.
The president was particularly disparaging of Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, a vocal opponent who has strongly rejected any move to send troops to Chicago.
"You send them, and instead of being praised, they're saying, 'you're trying to take over the Republic,'" said Trump.
"These people are sick."
Pritzker, a billionaire businessman like Trump, launched his own broadside at the president in a Monday press conference, calling him "a wannabe dictator" who "wants to use the military to occupy a US city, punish his dissidents, and score political points."
Trump further tightened his clampdown Monday by signing an executive order to investigate and prosecute people who burn the American flag -- despite a 1989 ruling by the US Supreme Court saying that the act is protected by freedom of speech laws.
"If you burn a flag you get one year in jail -- no early exits, no nothing," Trump said.
