'Public service announcement': Calls for violence worry experts before Trump arraignment

A wave of demands for violence in response to the indictment of former President Donald Trump has security experts nervous ahead of Tuesday’s arraignment, the New York Times reported Sunday.

Close allies of Trump, together with fervent fans from his MAGA base, unleashed a torrent of demands for civil war and acts of retribution – calls to arms that have been echoed on right-wing media.

Political violence experts told the Times that actual attacks become much more likely when prominent figures issue such threats with no apparent repercussions.

Among worrying calls was a tweet from Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) that a militia expert said was a coded message effectively calling for civil war. "This is scary as hell," said award-winning journalist Jeff Sharlet.

Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs tweeted “eye for an eye,” while Trump’s son’s fiance, Kimberly Guilfoyle, wrote: “Retribution is coming.” Kari Lake, a Trump supporter and election denier who lost her run to become Arizona governor in 2022, said, “I have a message tonight for Merrick Garland and Jack Smith and Joe Biden — and the guys back there in the fake news media, you should listen up as well, this one is for you.

“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. And I’m going to tell you, most of us are card-carrying members of the N.R.A.

“That’s not a threat, that’s a public service announcement.”

“So far, the politicians who have used this rhetoric to inspire people to violence have not been held accountable,” Mary McCord, a former senior Justice Department official and an expert on ties between extremist language and violence, told the Times.

“Until that happens, there’s little deterrent to using this type of language.”

“Rhetoric like this has consequences,” Timothy J. Heaphy, the investigator who headed the inquiry into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, told the Times.

“People who we interviewed for the Jan. 6 investigation said they came to the Capitol because politicians and the president told them to be there. Politicians think that when they say things it’s just rhetoric, but people listen to it and take it seriously. In this climate politicians need to realize this and be more responsible.”