House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) should be charged with inciting violence, President Donald Trump said on Thursday following the Democrat calling for “maximum warfare” in the nationwide redistricting fight and yet another assassination attempt that followed.
“This lunatic, Hakeem ‘Low IQ’ Jeffries, should be charged with INCITING VIOLENCE! The Radical Left Democrats actually want to Destroy our Country. President DJT,” Trump wrote, sharing a side-by-side image showing Jeffries calling for “maximum warfare” and the would-be assassin prepping to run through a security checkpoint at the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) dinner just days later.
Jeffries made the controversial remark during a press conference with Democrat leaders, discussing redistricting efforts. He said [emphasis added]:
We are in an era of maximum warfare everywhere, all the time, and we’re going to keep the pressure on Republicans in every single state in the union to ensure, at the end of the day, that there is a fair national map, because we believe that it’s the people – the people who should decide who’s in the majority in the next Congress – not Donald Trump and MAGA extremists.
Days later, a suspect identified as Cole Tomas Allen – armed with a “12-gauge pump action shotgun, a .38 caliber pistol, multiple knives and daggers, and a significant amount of ammunition for reloading” – charged through a magnetometer at the Washington Hilton in an alleged attempt to murder President Trump as well as members of his administration.
In a manifesto that was scheduled to be emailed to several individuals around the time of the attempted attack, Allen allegedly wrote that he would go through “most everyone here to get to the targets if it were absolutely necessary,” calling Trump a “pedophile, rapist, and traitor” and deeming attendees “complicit.”
“And I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist, and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes,” the manifesto reads.
WATCH — Leavitt: Lies About Trump Have Led “Crazy People to Believe Crazy Things” and “Commit Violence”
Secret Service ultimately thwarted the attack, and Allen has since been charged with attempting to assassinate the president. He also faces two firearms charges as well as a count for “assault on a federal law enforcement officer with a deadly weapon,” per CBS News.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt pointed out following the attack that Trump has been under siege from leftists for well over a decade, and the smears and acts of violence are coinciding.
“Nobody in recent years has faced more bullets and more violence than President Trump. This political violence stems from a systemic demonization of him and his supporters by commentators; yes, by elected members of the Democrat party; and even some in the media,” Leavitt said.
“This hateful and constant and violent rhetoric directed at President Trump, day after day after day for 11 years, has helped to legitimize this violence and bring us to this dark moment,” she continued, urging reporters to “read the manifesto of this shooter” and “ask yourselves, ‘How different is the rhetoric from this almost-assassin than what you read on social media and hear in various forums every single day?’”
She added, “The answer, if you’re being honest with yourself, is that there is no difference at all.”
WATCH — Disgusting! Karoline Leavitt Lists Violent Rhetoric from Leftist Officials:
Jeffries is in good company, as many Democrats and the media have a long history of describing Trump negatively, falsely referring to him as a dictator, Nazi, fascist, Hitler, evil person, murderer, and more.
Jeffries, meanwhile, refused to apologize for his fighting words.
“As it relates to the comment related to ‘maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time,’ in connection with the redistricting battle that Republicans launched, I stand by it,” Jeffries said.
“You can continue to criticize me for it,” Jeffries said of Republicans. “I don’t give a damn about the criticism … get lost.”
Notably, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) also responded to Jeffries’ threats, specifically when it came to redistricting, which the governor moved forward with in the Sunshine State.
DeSantis mocked Jeffries, saying, “‘We gonna do maximum warfare against Republicans. Florida Republicans, you f around, you going to find out.’ All this stuff. And you know what I said was, listen, and he’s like, oh, if you do the redistricting, we’re going to take out all your members. We’re going to do all this stuff.”
“And what I said was, go ahead, make my day,” he said, daring Democrats to try.
“You want to come down here and spend money and in Florida? Roll the dice and take your chances, but don’t think that you can come down here, issue threats to us, and somehow you’re going to make us flinch,” DeSantis said. “That is not happening.”
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