Arizona’s Attorney General Kris Mayes says that Donald Trump violated the law when describing former Rep. Liz Cheney facing a firing squad.
“She’s a radical war hawk,” Trump said of Cheney. “Let’s put her with a rifle standing there, with nine barrels shooting at her, okay? Let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face.”
AG Mayes nearly wet her pants.
“I have already asked my criminal division chief to start looking at that statement, analyzing it for whether it qualifies as a death threat under Arizona’s laws,” Mayes told 12News.
Mayes wants Trump to go to jail for getting people riled up.
“It is the kind of thing that riles people up, and that makes our situation in Arizona and other states more dangerous.”
It’s a good thing I wasn’t drinking anything when I first read that ridiculous comment from Mayes. I would have spat the contents of my mouth on the monitor.
Other comments by left-wing media were even worse.
Reason.com:
Trump did not say Cheney “should be fired upon” (as CNN reported), recommend “executing her” (as CNN anchor Sara Sidner claimed), suggest that she “go before a firing squad” (as The Atlantic‘s David Graham averred), or make “a dark and ominous threat” of “death” against her (as The New Republic‘s Hafiz Rashid asserted).
Referring to pro-intervention politicians who favor U.S. military interventions, Trump said, “You know, they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building, saying, ‘Oh, gee, well, let’s send, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy.'”
But Kamala Harris and the Democrats thought they had a winning theme, so they pounced.
“Anyone who wants to be president of the United States who uses that kind of violent rhetoric is clearly disqualified and unqualified to be president,” she said in Madison, Wisconsin. She doesn’t even have to use “violent rhetoric” to be disqualified from being president, so maybe she’s jealous of Trump.
The blatant distortion of Trump’s comments is part of a pattern, and it reflects a broader problem. With four days to go before the presidential election, people who rightly worry about what a second term for Trump could mean might have a chance to persuade on-the-fence voters that his authoritarian instincts, reflected in his frequently expressed desire to punish his political opponents after he regains power, make him unfit for office. But when Trump’s critics try to do that by misrepresenting easily checked facts, they encourage potentially persuadable voters to dismiss the case against him as mendacious fearmongering.
This episode is similar to what happened after Trump, during a Fox News interview with Maria Bartiromo a couple of weeks ago, was asked whether he was “expecting chaos on Election Day” if “you win.” Trump said the “National Guard or, if really necessary, the military” could “handle” rioting by “radical left lunatics,” because “they can’t let that happen.” The New York Times inaccurately reported that Trump had “openly suggested turning the military on American citizens simply because they oppose his candidacy,” and other news outlets offered a similar spin.
I can remember a time when reporters got into trouble when they misquoted a politician. Today, they get a salary bump and a choice spot commenting on the election.
