Trump Keeps Blaming ‘The Left’ For Political Violence — After Stoking It For Years

US President Donald Trump takes questions from reporters before boarding Air Force One at Morristown Municipal Airport in Morristown, New Jersey on September 14, 2025 WASHINGTON — On the afternoon of August 8, a Georgia police officer was gunned down as he tried to protect a thousand federal workers from a shooter addled by Covid vaccine disinformation and armed with two rifles, a shotgun and a handgun.President Donald Trump did not order US flags to be lowered to half staff. He did not release a video speaking of the killing from the Oval Office. He did not attend the funeral. Indeed, to this day, a full five weeks later, the president has has not publicly mentioned the killing of David Rose at all — but has provided yet another stark example of his willingness to countenance, condone and even encourage political violence by his supporters and perceived supporters over the years.In contrast, Trump is affording political ally and right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk the trappings of a state funeral following his assassination last week. He immediately ordered flags to be lowered to half staff. Kirk’s casket was taken to his home in Arizona aboard Air Force 2. And Trump himself plans to attend the funeral this Sunday.White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson would not respond to HuffPost queries about why Trump has not spoken about Rose’s death in the line of duty. Instead she pointed to Trump’s recent remarks.“As the survivor of two assassination attempts — and now watching his dear friend Charlie be assassinated — no one understands the dangers of political violence more than President Trump. That’s why, following Charlie’s assassination, President Trump delivered powerful and unifying remarks urging all Americans to ‘commit themselves to the American values for which Charlie Kirk lived and died,’” Jackson said in a statement.The remarks Trump delivered last week, however, did not ask Americans to unify. Rather, they blamed violence on his political opponents. “For years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world’s worst mass murderers and criminals. This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today, and it must stop right now,” he said in an Oval Office video.President Donald Trump speaks with reporters before he departs on Air Force One at Morristown Airport on Sept. 14 in Morristown, New Jersey.“Donald Trump is an arsonist. Always has been, always will be,” said Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman from Illinois who broke with his party over Trump.The White House did not provide any backup for Trump’s claim, while actual scientific research suggests the opposite.“Data on extremists in the United States showed that left-wing radicals were less likely to use violence than right-wing and Islamist radicals,” a 2022 paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found. “Our results are in line with past research showing that conservative ideology — represented in our datasets by both right-wing and Islamist causes — is positively related to violent political behavior.”Gary LaFree, a University of Maryland criminology and criminal justice professor and one of the study’s co-authors, said the assassination attempts against Trump in 2024, the 2024 killing of a health care executive in New York City and Kirk’s murder last week may point to a shift, but cautioned against drawing conclusions.“The current case is a good example. Classifying this guy as left wing is a push. Same with the earlier assassination attempt on President Trump. For that matter the [Luigi] Mangione case is also a bit complicated. A few cases is not a trend but there is some evidence that the lines are getting blurred,” he told HuffPost. “We were in the midst of collecting new data on the topic when our project was cut by the Trump administration.”In any event, Trump’s silence about Rose, a Marine Corps veteran in Afghanistan who left behind two young children and a wife pregnant with a third, is consistent with Trump’s muted or even nonexistent statements following attacks on those who are not his supporters.It took a full week for Trump to call Pennsylvania’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, after an arsonist set the governor’s mansion on fire in April. The following month, Trump said he was considering pardons for those convicted of trying to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, also a Democrat. “It looked to me like somewhat of a railroad job,” he said.When a Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband were murdered in their home in June, Trump said he had no intention of calling that state’s Democratic leader, Gov. Tim Walz. “Why would I call him? I could call and say, ‘Hi, how you doing?’ Uh, the guy doesn’t have a clue. He’s a mess. I could be nice and call, but why waste time?” he said.Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and his wife Gwen Walz attend a candlelight vigil for former House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark, who were fatally shot, at the state Capitol on June 18 in St. Paul, Minnesota.And following the 2022 attack on the husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, during which the assailant nearly killed Paul Pelosi with hammer blows to the head, Trump laughed and joked about it, as did many of his supporters.Meanwhile, Trump personally has been encouraging violence since he began his first campaign for president in 2015.In 2016, he encouraged his supporters at a rally to assault protesters and told them he would pay their legal fees, if they wound up facing any. “Just knock the hell — I promise you, I will pay for the legal fees,” he said.During a 2017 visit to Long Island as president, he told police officers it was okay if they injured suspects in the course of arresting them. “When you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon, you just seen them thrown in, rough. I said, ‘Please don’t be too nice,’” he said.In 2020, according to his own Defence Secretary Mark Esper, he wanted troops to shoot protesters speaking out about the murder of a Black man at the hands of white police officers in Minneapolis.And during the January 6, 2021, rally he organised as part of his coup attempt to remain in power despite losing reelection, he told his supporters that they would “lose” their country if they did not fight harder and told them to march on the Capitol. “When you catch somebody in a fraud, you are allowed to go by very different rules,” he said, repeating his lie that the election had been stolen from him.In the years to come, Trump participated in a recording by the so-called “J6 Choir,” a group of some of the most violent police assaulters from that day, and in the coming months would regularly stand at attention and salute them at his rallies. Upon retaking office, he pardoned and released from prison hundreds of convicted felons who had beaten, punched, kicked, pepper-sprayed and otherwise assaulted officers, resulting in 140 injuries and five police deaths.“The country needs to hang on as best as we can these next three years, because with him in the White House, the country could quite literally blow up,” Walsh said.Related...Trump's Ukraine Envoy Declares Russia Is 'Losing' The War As He Rips Into Putin's ArmyChannel 4 To Greet Trump’s State Visit With A Brutal Broadcast He Won’t ForgetTrump Claims Hatred Between Zelenskyy And Putin Is 'Unfathomable'

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