Well, What Did You Expect to Happen?
As they accuse Trump of being a threat to democracy, the left's own rhetoric led to an actual threat to democracy.
“Donald Trump is a genuine threat to this nation. He’s a threat to our freedom. He’s a threat to our democracy. He’s literally a threat to everything America stands for.” - Joe Biden, June 28, 2024.
“Trump poses many threats to our country: The right to choose, civil rights, voting rights, and America’s standing in the world. But the greatest threat he poses is to our democracy. If we lose that, we lose everything.” - Joe Biden, December 20, 2023.
“… it’s time to put Trump in a bullseye.” - Joe Biden, July 8, 2024
“… anyone transported back to 1932 Germany could very, very easily have explained away Herr Hitler’s excesses and been persuaded that his critics were going overboard… But he and his people vowed all along that they would use the tools of democracy to destroy it… we can spend this election year in one of two ways. We can spend it debating whether Trump meets the nine or 17 points that define fascism. Or we can spend it saying, ‘He’s damn close enough, and we’d better fight.’” - The New Republic Magazine, July 7, 2024.
The New Republic released that statement along with this magazine cover:
Those three statements above are just a few examples of the rhetoric surrounding Donald Trump over the past eight years. We have all heard the statements before—Trump is literally Hitler, he is a threat to democracy, this election may be the last election. Everyone knows that none of that is true. The average American, as shown by the poll numbers, doesn’t believe any of what the left says about Trump. But as we found out yesterday, all it takes one person to believe the lies.
Let me be clear, I’m not blaming Biden, the New Republic, or anyone on the left for the assassination attempt. The responsibility for that lies solely with the shooter. I don’t blame people for others misconstruing their words and then using those words for violence. Unless the speaker called for the violence, the speaker is not responsible for violence that ensues.
However, the left is responsible for raising the temperature in regards to Trump. They are responsible for raising the temperature so high that some crazed person may take matters into their own hands and attempt to kill Trump.
Members on the left have already attempted to blame Trump for his own assassination attempt. ABC’s Martha Raddatz, on with George Stephanopoulos, suggested that Trump’s comment about a “bloodbath” if he is not elected led to the attempt on his life (and she used this line despite it being clear that Trump was talking about an economic bloodbath for the auto industry, which is a term regularly used by political members on both sides of the aisle). She then brought up January 6th.
Let’s talk about January 6th. Just as the left is responsible for raising the temperature around Trump, Trump was responsible for raising the temperature around the 2020 election to the point that some followers of his would want to overturn the election by force. Trump either lied about the election, or he was so egotistical that he honestly believed and spread clearly false claims about the election. But, just as the left isn’t responsible for the assassination attempt on Trump, Trump isn’t responsible for the actions of those who stormed the Capitol on January 6th. Trump told the protestors to “peacefully and patriotically” protest outside the Capitol, not to bust into the Capitol and injure officers.
That said, the left has used January 6th, and Trump’s conduct around January 6th, in irresponsible ways. January 6th is the left’s basis for saying that Trump will be a dictator, a fascist, a Hitler-type figure. But the truth is that most Americans see that Trump left office in 2020 without attempting to stage some sort of coup. Trump peacefully left the White House. When he was in office, he did not prosecute his political opponents. Yet they claim that this time will be different.
This time, he will be a dictator. This time, he will prosecute anyone who goes against him. This time, he won’t leave office. This time, he will be Hitler. And because of that, this will be the last election of our lives.
If someone honestly believed that, you can see why they would attempt to assassinate Trump. They would be single-handedly saving democracy. They would be an American hero.
But as I write this today, most people on the left, at least public figures, aren’t cheering the attempt. They are decrying it. But why? Because they know that everything they are saying is a lie. They know that Trump is not a dictator. They know that he will leave office, just as he did last time. They know that he is not Hitler. But they stop short of admitting that their inflammatory language raised the temperature so much that some lunatic who believed them could do something like this.
As much as the left likes to point to political violence on the right, the left has a strong history of violence that gets ignored. In 2015, a gunman killed five police officers in Dallas after then-President Obama repeatedly disparaged the police. In 2017, a Bernie Sanders supporter, angered by Conservatives who were outspoken against universal healthcare, shot four people at the congressional baseball game. Four people were hurt, including Congressman Steve Scalise, who nearly died as a result of his injuries. In 2020, the Black Lives Matter protests caused over 2 billion dollars in damages, and many people died during the protests across the country. In 2022, a man traveled to Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s home with a gun, intending to kill Kavanaugh.
Barack Obama was not responsible for the Dallas shooting. Bernie Sanders was not responsible for the actions of the congressional shooter. The left was not responsible for the actions of those in the riots (although many encouraged it). The left was not responsible for the man intending to kill Kavanaugh. But the left has conveniently ignored all of this. To them, there is no history of leftist political violence. Everything mentioned above is a one-off. A lone shooter. A person whose motives cannot be determined.
A shooting on this level cannot be ignored. It won’t be forgotten about. They may continue to say that the motive of the shooter is unknown, but that won’t fool anyone. It’s clear that the targeted language towards Trump raised the temperature so high that this maniac attempted to assassinate him. Everyone saw it, and everyone will remember it.
What does this shooting mean for the election?
Quite frankly, it means the election is over. The image of Trump after the shooting is legendary. Standing up, blood streaming down his face, fist in the air, American flag in the background. The image will be everywhere between now and November. A reminder of how Trump has continually been attacked, and how he stands up and fights back each time. That show of strength from the already Presidential-favorite will cement Trump as the 47th President.
There aren’t many paths for Biden to victory now. He needs a major inflection point in the campaign. The problem is that he’s all out of possible inflection points. Biden already failed in the debate. His recent attempts to boost his image in the eyes of voters have failed. Trump’s criminal cases are all suspended, and his sentencing for the New York trial has been suspended until at least September, and may never come to fruition. Most importantly, Trump survived the assassination attempt.
The only thing the Democrats can do is force an inflection point. By that, I mean they must force Biden out. Biden’s image may recover a little bit in time for the election, but not enough to overcome the positive feelings that the image above generated for Trump.
The Democrat’s only chance is to put someone new in on the ballot. Shift focus away from this assassination attempt. Shift focus away from Biden’s mental acuities (or lack thereof). Right now, there is nothing else the Democrats can do stop Trump from regaining office.
In the meantime, the rhetoric from the Democrats must change. No longer can Trump be the “threat to democracy.” The voters aren’t buying that. It’s the Biden DOJ that is prosecuting Trump. It was Trump who was nearly assassinated. The contrast that Biden has been attempting to draw between him and Trump has failed, and he can’t recover.
While Biden’s contrast has failed, the Trump campaign gained a new contrast between him and Biden—Trump was an inch away from death yesterday, Biden is an inch away from death everyday.