WASHINGTON ― In the event you occur to observe Rep. Derrick Van Orden’s official account on X, you’d see his swift rejection of violence in response to final week’s horrific killing of right-wing political activist Charlie Kirk.
“There is no place for political violence in America,” the Wisconsin Republican stated Wednesday, the day Kirk was shot at a Utah occasion.
However on his private account, Van Orden is giving a special message: He’s inviting battle in opposition to “these leftist scumbags” as retaliation for Kirk’s homicide.
“Today we remember those lost on September 11, 2001. It was the reason I went to war for over 20 years,” he posted Thursday on this account. “Yesterday is the reason I will be at war for the next 20. I will not allow these leftist scumbags to take my country.”
These messages, posted a day aside, are from the identical particular person. However Van Orden, like another Republicans in Congress, is utilizing separate social media accounts — one aimed toward constituents, the opposite aimed toward political supporters – to ship contradictory and disturbing messages about Kirk’s assassination. There may be nonetheless no identified motive for Kirk’s killing or any understanding of potential political beliefs the alleged shooter, 22-year-old Utah resident Tyler Robinson, might have.
Within the 5 days after Kirk was killed, Van Orden posted about him thrice on his official X account, which has roughly 7,800 followers. These messages are largely about praying for Kirk’s household. On his private account, the place he has 81,000 followers, Van Orden posted about Kirk greater than 550 occasions in the identical span of days. All through these posts, the Wisconsin Republican baselessly blames Democrats, Democratic organizations, billionaire Democratic donor George Soros and the media for inflicting Kirk’s homicide.
“These people are domestic terrorists,” Van Orden wrote in considered one of these posts, referring to individuals who wrote messages in chalk on a sidewalk close to White Home advisor Stephen Miller’s home, criticizing his assaults on democracy.
In one other, he falsely accuses the Democratic Congressional Marketing campaign Committee and the Democratic Nationwide Committee of fanning a civil battle: “The DCCC/DNC and the complicit media are driving America to a second civil war,” he claims in this put up. “Until they collectively renounce members of their own party, I’m done with them.”
“Correct,” Van Orden says in one other message, responding to a put up falsely claiming Democrats orchestrated Kirk’s killing as a result of “assassination became their last resort.”
A Van Orden spokesperson didn’t reply to a request for remark.
He’s not the one one utilizing totally different accounts to sentence, and fan, political violence after Kirk’s killing. On her official X account with roughly 678,000 followers, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) has praised Kirk’s “grace” and steered he would need folks to answer violence with prayer.
“We know Charlie Kirk would want us to pray for such an evil, and lost individual like Tyler Robinson to find Jesus Christ,” Mace stated Friday. “We will try to do the same.”
A day later, on her private account, she was falsely accusing Democrats of being murderers in dramatic, all-caps messages.
“I repeat: DEMOCRATS OWN THIS,” Mace wrote on this account, which has 506,000 followers. “Time for the TRUTH. For years democrats and the fake news dehumanized conservatives by calling us nazis, hitler and fascists. They made extremism and violence MAINSTREAM and cool. They celebrate murder and burning cities. Never back down. Now more than ever: HOLD THE LINE.”
Mace, who’s at present operating for governor, claimed in one other put up right here that there’s “no uniting” with Democrats within the aftermath of Kirk’s killing as a result of they “want to murder us.”
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), too, is urging prayers and unity on his official X account.
“I have introduced a resolution condemning the assassination of Charlie Kirk, commemorating his outstanding patriotism and achievements,” he posted Wednesday. “I look forward to the Senate uniting to honor Charlie, his family, and his courageous legacy.”
He adopted up on Thursday with a want for no such violence once more: “As the FBI and Utah law enforcement continue to reveal more about the motives behind this heinous assassination, let us once more pray that justice be done, that Charlie Kirk’s family be surrounded by love and comfort, and that we never allow such a crime to happen again.”
However over on his private account, Lee was baselessly accusing a imprecise faction of Democrats — “they” — as being accountable for Kirk’s loss of life.
“Meanwhile, they’ve painted the killer as the good man — while celebrating the death of the murder victim,” Lee stated Saturday. His remark was in response to a different put up that said, “The left did this. They radicalized the killer and he murdered a good man. Then they celebrated. I will never unify with the monsters who did this.”
In one other message on his private account, the Utah Republican on Friday shared another person’s put up that includes the faces of distinguished Democrats in politics, together with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), MSNBC political pundit Rachel Maddow and former Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris. The unique poster shared these photographs with the sentence, “Here is the roadmap to Charlie Kirk’s assassination…”
Lee piled on together with his personal excessive rhetoric, suggesting Democrats have been hoping somebody would assassinate Kirk: “When they brand conservatives as Hitler, they encourage the criminally insane to launch Operation Valkyrie.”
SAUL LOEB through Getty Pictures
Some Republican lawmakers aren’t even pretending to attempt to deliver down the reckless political rhetoric in Washington, D.C.
Throughout a Thursday Fox Information section about Kirk, the day after he had been killed, Rep. Randy High-quality (R-Fla.) accused “the left” of being “so righteous” that they consider “the ends justify the means” for political causes.
“We have to say to our friends on the other side, we can’t survive as a country if this is how we settle our differences,” High-quality stated within the interview, a video of which he shared on his X account. “So they have to decide, do they want us to survive as a country? Unfortunately, I fear for too many, they don’t.”
The Florida Republican went additional Monday, describing Democrats as “an enemy that believes that they are so right, that they can advance their cause by any means necessary.”
“They believe in violence,” High-quality stated in a video posted on his X account. “It is core to their views. And we have tolerated it in our country for far too long.”
HuffPost reached out to all of those Republicans’ places of work for remark.
A Mace spokesperson didn’t reply. Lee spokesman Billy Gribbin responded solely by sending a meme used to point a patronizing sneer. High-quality spokesman Estaban Elizando twice declined to provide remark and claimed he had by no means heard of HuffPost.
“They believe in violence. It is core to their views.”
– Rep. Randy High-quality (R-Fla.) on Democrats
It’s not onerous to see Republicans taking their cues from President Donald Trump, who has been dangerously, and falsely, blaming Democrats and liberals for political violence and Kirk’s loss of life. Within the hours after Kirk was shot, when particulars have been scant about what had occurred, Trump responded by delivering an Oval Workplace speech condemning “the radical left” for the violent assault.
“For years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis, and the world’s worst mass murderers and criminals,” he learn aloud from pre-written remarks. “This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today, and it must stop now.”
Besides the president’s personal document of selling violent rhetoric has spanned his political profession. From encouraging rally-goers to assault protesters, to saying he’d prefer to punch them himself, to glorifying violence in opposition to journalists, to egging on his supporters as they attacked police and stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump has by no means been refined about supporting violent rhetoric within the context of criticizing his perceived political enemies.
He’s additionally been noticeably silent in response to political violence aimed toward Democrats. It took him every week to name Pennsylvania’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, after somebody set the governor’s mansion on fireplace in April. In Might, he stated he was contemplating pardons for the folks convicted of plotting to kidnap Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. He doesn’t speak in regards to the Democratic Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband who have been murdered of their house in June, in what seemed to be a politically motivated taking pictures.
In a very disgusting second, Trump mocked former Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and her household after a person broke into her house in 2022 and almost killed her husband with hammer blows to the pinnacle. The attacker, David DePape, testified in his trial that he was motivated by far-right conspiracy theories unfold by Trump.
Particularly within the wake of Kirk’s tragic killing, Trump might be utilizing his platform and affect to name for an finish to all political violence. As a substitute, he’s merely attempting to direct it at Democrats.
“Radical left political violence has hurt too many innocent people and taken too many lives,” he stated in his Oval Workplace remarks. Two days later, he was sending the identical harmful message to thousands and thousands of individuals throughout an interview on Fox Information.
“The radicals on the left are the problem,” Trump claimed Friday in his TV interview. “And they’re vicious, and they’re horrible, and they’re politically savvy.”
White Home spokesperson Abigail Jackson twice declined to provide any remark in response to Trump fanning harmful rhetoric on social media, and as a substitute mocked this reporter for a social media put up regarding navy deployments in Washington, D.C.
Home Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) was requested Tuesday by reporters if he thinks Trump ought to cease calling Democrats “evil” and “enemies.” He initially responded by attacking Democrats, saying Trump has been “called the most despicable names by people on the left for a long, long time.”
However he adopted up with a plea for everybody to tone down their political rhetoric.
“Look, there’s a lot of heated rhetoric all around and what I’m trying to advance here is this idea that we can have bigger policy debates,” Johnson stated. “That is the legacy of Charlie [Kirk]. He loved the debate, but he didn’t hate the people on the other side. And that’s what I’m trying to encourage all of us to remember.”
Arthur Delaney contributed reporting.
