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Trump Documents Inquiry The Indictment, Annotated Trump Is Charged How Indictments Work Where Documents Were Found Other Trump Investigations

Trump Supporters’ Violent Rhetoric in

His Defense Disturbs Experts
The former president’s allies have portrayed the indictment as an
act of war and called for retribution, which political violence
experts say increases the risk of action.

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“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,” said Kari Lake, the
Republican former candidate for governor of Arizona. “And I’m going to tell you, most
of us are card-carrying members of the N.R.A.” Jon Cherry for The New York Times

By Michael S. Schmidt , Alan Feuer , Maggie Haberman and Adam Goldman

June 10, 2023

The federal indictment of former President Donald J. Trump has

unleashed a wave of calls by his supporters for violence and an
uprising to defend him, disturbing observers and raising concerns
of a dangerous atmosphere ahead of his court appearance in Miami
on Tuesday.

In social media posts and public remarks, close allies of Mr. Trump
— including a member of Congress — have portrayed the
indictment as an act of war, called for retribution and highlighted
the fact that much of his base carries weapons. The allies have
painted Mr. Trump as a victim of a weaponized Justice Department
controlled by President Biden, his potential opponent in the 2024
election.

The calls to action and threats have been amplified on right-wing

media sites and have been met by supportive responses from
social media users and cheers from crowds, who have become
conditioned over several years by Mr. Trump and his allies to see
any efforts to hold him accountable as assaults against him.

Experts on political violence warn that attacks against people or

institutions become more likely when elected officials or prominent
media figures are able to issue threats or calls for violence with
impunity. The pro-Trump mob that attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6,
2021, was drawn to Washington in part by a post on Twitter from
Mr. Trump weeks earlier, promising that it would be “wild.”

The former president alerted the public to the indictment on

Thursday evening in posts on his social media platform, attacking
the Justice Department and calling the case “THE GREATEST
WITCH HUNT OF ALL TIME.”

“Eye for an eye,” wrote Representative Andy Biggs, Republican of

Arizona, in a post on Twitter on Friday. His warning came shortly
before the special counsel in the case, Jack Smith, spoke to the
public for the first time since he took over the investigation of Mr.
Trump’s retention of classified documents.

On Instagram, Mr. Trump’s eldest son’s fiancée, Kimberly

Guilfoyle, posted a photo of the former president with the words,
“Retribution Is Coming,” in all capital letters.

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In Georgia, at the Republican state convention, Kari Lake, who

refused to concede the Arizona election for governor in 2022 and
who is an ardent defender of Mr. Trump, emphasized that many of
Mr. Trump’s supporters owned guns.

“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,” Ms. Lake said. “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.”

The crowd cheered.

Ms. Lake added: “That’s not a threat, that’s a public service

announcement.”

Political violence experts say that even if aggressive language by

high-profile individuals does not directly end in physical harm, it
creates a dangerous atmosphere in which the idea of violence
becomes more accepted, especially if such rhetoric is left
unchecked.

Representative Andy Biggs, Republican of Arizona, wrote “Eye for an eye” on Twitter
on Friday in response to news of the indictment, before its particulars were
released. Al Drago for The New York Times

“So far, the politicians who have used this rhetoric to inspire people
to violence have not been held accountable,” said Mary McCord, a
former senior Justice Department official who has studied the ties
between extremist rhetoric and violence. “Until that happens,
there’s little deterrent to using this type of language.”

The language used by some right-wing media figures was more

stark.

On Pete Santilli’s talk show, the conservative provocateur declared

that if he were the commandant of the Marine Corps, he would
order “every single Marine” to grab President Biden, “throw him in
freakin’ zip ties in the back of a freakin’ pickup truck,” and “get him
out of the White House.”

One of his guests, Lance Migliaccio, said that if it were legal and he
had access, he would “probably walk in and shoot” Gen. Mark A.
Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and someone Mr.
Trump has identified as one of his enemies.

So far, the reactions from Mr. Trump’s supporters have been more
intense and explicit than those expressed after Mr. Trump was
indicted in a separate case by the Manhattan district attorney
Alvin L. Bragg in late March.

Shortly before that indictment, Mr. Trump posted an article on

Truth Social, his social media platform, that included a photo of
himself holding a baseball bat on one side, and Mr. Bragg in an
adjacent photo. Dueling crowds of pro-Trump and anti-Trump
protesters appeared in Lower Manhattan when Mr. Trump was
arraigned there in April.

On Saturday, in his first public remarks since the latest indictment

on seven charges related to the retention of classified documents
and efforts to obstruct justice, Mr. Trump attacked those
investigating him as engaged in “demented persecution.”

The F.B.I. has been the target of much criticism from far-right
Republican lawmakers and the former president’s supporters. In
the wake of the heated partisanship, F.B.I. field offices are
reporting all threats related to their personnel or facilities to the
Washington headquarters, in an unusual step. A law enforcement
familiar with the move said the F.B.I. was trying to get a handle on
the number of threats around the country directed at the agency.

Despite whatever security precautions are taken for Mr. Trump’s

appearance on Tuesday, security experts said that the rhetoric and
the threats from it were unlikely to subside and would likely
become more pronounced as the case moves forward and the 2024
election nears.

“Rhetoric like this has consequences,” said Timothy J. Heaphy, the

lead investigator for the select House committee that investigated
the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and Mr. Trump’s efforts to remain in
the White House after his presidency. “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.”

On Instagram on Saturday morning, Mr. Trump posted a mash-up

video of himself swinging a golf club on the course and an
animation of a golf ball hitting President Biden in the head,
superimposed with footage of Mr. Biden falling at a public event in
recent days after he tripped over something onstage.

It was hardly the first time that figures on the right have issued
calls for war or violence to support the former president, or the
first time that Mr. Trump has appeared to summon his supporters
to amass on his behalf.

In the days leading up to the attack on the Capitol, the notion that a
civil war was drawing near was prevalent in right-wing circles.
Extremist leaders like Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the Oath
Keepers militia, and Enrique Tarrio, the chairman of the Proud
Boys, often rallied their groups with incendiary references to the
cleansing violence of the American Revolution. Both men have
been convicted of sedition in connection with the Capitol attack.

More broadly, on far-right websites, people shared tactics and

techniques for attacking the building and discussed building
gallows and trapping lawmakers in tunnels there.

The federal courthouse in Miami where Mr. Trump is expected to appear Tuesday
afternoon for his arraignment. Gerald Herbert/Associated Press

The recent bout of warlike language coming in response to Mr.

Trump’s indictment echoed what took place among Republican
officials and media figures last summer after the F.B.I. searched
Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s private club and residence in Florida, as
part of the documents investigation and hauled away about 100
classified records.

“This. Means. War,” The Gateway Pundit, a pro-Trump outlet wrote

at the time, setting the tone for others. Hours later, Joe Kent, a
Trump-endorsed House candidate in Washington State, went on a
podcast run by Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s onetime political
adviser, and declared, “This just shows everyone what many of us
have been saying for a very long time. We’re at war.”

Indeed, within days of the heated language that followed the

search of Mar-a-Lago, an Ohio man armed with a semiautomatic
rifle tried to breach the F.B.I. field office near Cincinnati and wound
up killed in a shootout with the local police.
Jonathan Swan contributed reporting.

Michael S. Schmidt is a Washington correspondent covering national security and

federal investigations. He was part of two teams that won Pulitzer Prizes in 2018 — one
for reporting on workplace sexual harassment and the other for coverage of President
Trump and his campaign’s ties to Russia. @ NYTMike
Alan Feuer covers extremism and political violence. He joined The Times in 1999.
@ alanfeuer
Maggie Haberman is a senior political correspondent and the author of “Confidence
Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America.” She was part of a team
that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for reporting on President Trump’s advisers and their
connections to Russia. @ maggieNYT
Adam Goldman reports on the F.B.I. and national security from Washington, D.C., and is
a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner. He is the coauthor of “Enemies Within: Inside the
NYPD's Secret Spying Unit and bin Laden's Final Plot Against America.”
@ adamgoldmanNYT
A version of this article appears in print on June 11, 2023 , Section A , Page 18 of the New York edition with the
headline: Trump Backers Unleash Wave of Violent Threats, Worrying Some Analysts . Order Reprints | Today’s Paper |

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Our Coverage of the Trump Documents Case

The Justice Department has filed federal criminal charges against former President
Donald Trump over his mishandling of classified documents.

Getting the Call: Trump was gathered with his core political advisers at his club in
Bedminster, N.J., when he was informed he had been indicted for the second time
in less than three months.

Coming to Full Circle: In 2016, Trump assailed Hillary Clinton for her handling of
sensitive information . Now, the same issue threatens his chances of reclaiming
the presidency.
Picking Florida: The decision to file charges in Miami eliminates what would have
been a considerable risk to the politically fraught case: a legal fight over where
the charges would be filed .

Who is Jack Smith?: The special counsel who indicted Trump is a former
prosecutor who was chosen for his experience in bringing high-stakes cases
against politicians.
Reactions: After the indictment, Trump’s Republican rivals in the 2024
presidential campaign faced an uncomfortable choice : rallying behind the former
president or looking like they weren’t fully on Team G.O.P.

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