Donald Trump Blaming Democrats for Apparent Assassination Attempt Is Part of the Problem
Republicans wasted little time blaming Democrats for the second apparent assassination attempt on Donald Trump, suggestingâas they did in Julyâthat his opponents were engaging in âirresponsible rhetoric,â as Representative Anna Paulina Luna put it Sunday. âNo leader in American history has endured more attacks and remained so strong and resilient,â said House Speaker Mike Johnson, who was at Mar-a-Lago Sunday, the day authorities thwarted an alleged attempt on the former presidentâs life.
âThis rhetoric against President Trump, this narrative that he will be the next dictator, that he is the next Hitler coming, it has got to stop,â Representative Mike Waltz said on Fox News. âEnough is enough.â
It should go without saying that political violence has no place in America, as Kamala Harris and the Democrats were quick to emphasize Sunday. âI am thankful that former President Trump is safe,â the vice president said in a statement. It should also go without saying that words have consequences, and leaders have a responsibility to avoid the kind of dishonest, incendiary rhetoric that can create the conditions for violenceâespecially in a country with maddeningly easy access to high-powered weapons.
But calling out that rhetoric, as mainstream Democrats have done, is not the same as engaging in it, as Republicans are allegingâand if the temperature of our political climate is to be brought down, it’s important to be clear-eyed about who has been turning it up in the first place. âViolent rhetoric is wrong, and has no place,â as the anti-Trump Republican Adam Kinzinger put it. âBut MAGA pretending they didnât light this fire is gaslighting to the 100th power.â
Indeed, Trump has built his political brand on the dark, hateful rhetoric he accuses his opponents of perpetuating. He has stirred up dangerous animus not only against his political foes (including his own former vice president), but against regular people who donât have the protections he and other leaders are afforded, like the Haitian immigrants in Ohioâwhom he, running mate JD Vance, and the MAGA right have spent demonizing with racist lies in recent days.
âTheyâre eating the pets,â Trump claimed on the debate stage last week, amplifying a debunked hate meme Vance has championed. (âDonât let the crybabies in the media dissuade you, fellow patriots,â the Ohio senator posted on X ahead of the debate Tuesday. âKeep the cat memes flowing.â) Thatâs not true. But Trump has kept on. âTheyâre destroying [Ohioansâ] way of life,â Trump insisted at a Friday rally. The result: fear among the Haitian community in Springfield and beyond, as well as bomb threats in the Ohio city that Trump refused to denounce Saturday. âI donât know what happened with the bomb threats,â he told reporters in Las Vegas. âI know that itâs been taken over by illegal immigrants and thatâs a terrible thing that happened.â
Trump’s rhetoricâand that of his running mate, who continued to espouse what he all but acknowledged to be lies about Haitians during a CNN appearance Sunday morningâis beyond the pale, even for a politician who has fashioned a career out of outrage. But Republicans have mostly stayed silent over the matter, or treated it more as a political liability than a threat to a community, or even participated in it: âProtect our ducks and kittens in Ohio!â the House GOP posted on X.
The idea here seems to be that Republicans can say anything they want, about anyone they want, and itâs fine. âTheyâre destroying our country,â Trump charged during last weekâs debate, falsely accusing Harris ofâamong other thingsâbeing a communist and supporting the murder of babies. But if Democrats object, theyâre being divisive. âI probably took a bullet to the head because of the things they say about me,â Trump said in the debate, referring to his injury at a rally shooting in July. (The alleged shooter in that Butler incident had donated $15 to a pro-Democratic group in 2021, but was a registered Republican; as of August, investigators still had not determined a motive.) âTheir rhetoric is causing me to be shot at,â Trump said on Fox News Monday, a day after the second alleged attempt on his life, âwhen I am the one who is going to save the country, and they are the ones that are destroying the country.â
âIt is called the enemy from within,â Trump added of Harris and President Joe Biden.
The circumstances of Sundayâs incident remained somewhat unclear Monday, as suspect Ryan Wesley Routh made his first court appearance and was charged with two federal gun crimes. The 58-year-oldâwho reportedly supported Trump in 2016 but subsequently criticized him in social media postsâwas taken into custody Sunday after a Secret Service agent saw a firearm sticking through a fence at Trumpâs golf course, just ahead of the former president, authorities said. Secret Service âopened fireâ on Routh, who fled and was apprehended about 45 miles north of the scene. Like the Butler shooter, Routh had an assault-style weapon. He also had a criminal history, and had reportedly expressed scattered political beliefs online, at one point supporting a Vivek Ramaswamy-Nikki Haley ticket.
âThis growing pattern of political violence needs to STOP right now,â Ramaswamy wrote on X. But that didnât stop other Trump allies from stoking the fire: âNo one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala đ€,â Elon Musk posted Sunday on the social media site he owns. He deleted the post afterward, claiming it was a âjokeâ taken out of context, and pointed the finger back at Democrats: âThe incitement to hatred and violence against President Trump by the media and leading Democrats,â he posted Monday, âneeds to stop.â