'Rhetoric like this has consequences': experts concerned about warlike language from Trump acolytes
From Kari Lake to congressmen throughout the United States, violent rhetoric following Donald Trump's federal indictment has reportedly been steady and is now officially raising red flags with experts.
The violent messages from Trump's supporters are not exactly new, as they have arisen before, including after the FBI raided the former president's property at Mar-a-Lago. But they do appear to be escalating, according to a report by Michael S. Schmidt, Alan Feuer, Maggie Haberman, and Adam Goldman of the New York Times.
"The federal indictment of former President Donald J. Trump has unleashed a wave of calls by his supporters for violence and an uprising to defend him, disturbing observers and raising concerns of a warlike atmosphere ahead of his court appearance in Miami on Tuesday," according to the article. "In social media posts and public remarks, close allies of Mr. Trump — including a member of Congress — have portrayed the indictment as an act of war, called for retribution and highlighted the fact that much of his base carries weapons."
The analysis further shows that this type of rhetoric could actually make real-life violence more likely.
"The calls to action and threats have been amplified on right-wing media sites and have been met by supportive responses from social media users and cheers from crowds, who have become conditioned over several years by Mr. Trump and his allies to see any efforts to hold him accountable as assaults against him," the New York Times writers wrote Saturday. "Experts on political violence warn that attacks against people or institutions become more likely when elected officials or prominent media figures are able to issue threats or calls for violence with impunity."
The article specifically points to the behavior of failed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake.
“'If you want to get to President Trump, you are going to have go through me, and you are going to have to go through 75 million Americans just like me,' said Lake, the Republican former candidate for governor of Arizona. 'And I’m going to tell you, most of us are card-carrying members of the N.R.A.'"
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