The latest headlines from our reporters across the US sent straight to your inbox each weekdayYour briefing on the latest headlines from across the US<\/p>\n
Long before a would-be assassin wounded former President Donald Trump, the fuse of political violence had been burning across America.<\/p>\n
Members of Congress have been shot. One lawmaker’s staffers in Virginia were attacked with a baseball bat. In Louisville, a bullet grazed the mayor\u2019s sweater after someone stormed into his campaign office. Someone put a tracking device on the Reno mayor’s car. Officials in South Carolina received death threats over a solar panel plant. And outside Buffalo, a man threw a dummy pipe bomb through the window of a county clerk candidate’s home \u2014 with a message reading: \u201cIf you don\u2019t drop out of this race, the next pipe bomb will be real.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are people who\u2019ve come to me and said, \u2018I contemplated running for my town office, and I could never imagine my family going through what you did, so I chose not to,\u2019\u201d said Melissa Hartman, who was targeted in the pipe bomb episode and ran for county clerk after serving as town supervisor in Eden.<\/p>\n
The attempt on Trump’s life was the latest and most stunning example of political violence and harassment playing out regularly across America, shaking the foundations of democracy and causing grave concern the atmosphere will worsen as Election Day nears. Trump and President Joe Biden each called for unity after the shooting, with the president telling the nation, \u201cWe can’t allow violence to be normalized.\u201d<\/p>\n
Intense partisanship, punctuated by violence, has long been a part of American politics. In 1798, congressmen from opposing parties brawled in the U.S. House chamber, beating each other with a cane and fireplace tongs. Four presidents have been killed by assassins, with other presidents and candidates wounded or targeted. Yet the attack on Trump evoked memories of more recent incidents. <\/p>\n
Democratic U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords was wounded in a 2011 shooting outside an Arizona grocery store. Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, now House majority leader, was shot in 2017 while practicing for a charity baseball game. Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan was the target of a foiled kidnapping plot uncovered in 2020.<\/p>\n
Even after the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol shocked the world, political violence continued. <\/p>\n
A man with a hammer bludgeoned the husband of then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, in their San Francisco home in 2022. Last year, a man with a history of mental illness went to the Fairfax, Virginia, district office of Democratic U.S. Rep. Gerry Connolly, looking to kill him with a baseball bat. Connolly wasn\u2019t there, so the man attacked two staffers.<\/p>\n
And there are dozens of stories from far lesser-known political officials like Hartman. <\/p>\n
She lost her county clerk race and hasn’t sought elective office since in her town of 7,700. The man who threw the dummy pipe bomb pleaded guilty. Hartman said he was paid to do it by a neighbor, and she remains skittish two years later. <\/p>\n
In York County, South Carolina, a suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina, County Council Chairwoman Christi Cox said that after the attempt on Trump, she felt compelled to speak about a letter she recently received. She’d sent her kids to get the mail and read it while they were nearby \u2014 a threat to kill her unless she stopped a solar panel manufacturer from building a $150 million plant receiving council-approved incentives. Cox is a Republican; an additional letter threatening the council’s only Democrat came to county offices.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur country is in a very dangerous and dark place right now, and I feel like some of that is spilling over to our community,\u201d she said at the council\u2019s Monday meeting. \u201cThe level of anger, hate, lies, accusations, fearmongering \u2014 it is rampant.”<\/p>\n
In Reno, Nevada, a far-right movement has targeted local politicians. Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve doesn’t know whether someone in that movement had the tracking device put on her vehicle, and she tries to avoid going to public places alone. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think people really forget that we\u2019re human beings,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
In Louisville, Kentucky, in 2022, a man burst into Mayor Craig Greenberg\u2019s campaign headquarters, firing shots. A bullet grazed his sweater. Staffers were unharmed.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbsolutely no good came from Saturday\u2019s heinous act,\u201d Greenberg said Monday. \u201cBut let\u2019s hope it\u2019s finally the wake-up call.\u201d<\/p>\n
Michigan state Sen. Jeremy Moss called the assassination attempt a moment to \u201creset.\u201d Moss, who’s Jewish and gay, faced personal threats over the years, including one from a man charged with using social media to threaten the lives of Jewish state officials.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope this is a moment that all of us on all sides of the political spectrum can say we all were saved by that bullet missing President Trump,” Moss said.<\/p>\n
The attack came a day after governors at a National Governors Association meeting in Salt Lake City committed to collaborating on public service announcements and other campaigns to show voters they can get along with political rivals. The association\u2019s outgoing chair, Republican Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, warned \u201cthere is nothing that says that we aren\u2019t going to continue to tear ourselves apart,\u201d if \u201cwe don\u2019t do the work.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can disagree without hating each other,” he said.<\/p>\n
Cooling the political climate will require both a change in messaging at the top and a willingness of rank-and-file voters to move closer to those who disagree with them, said Austin Doctor, of the National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education Center. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt takes a lot of work and consistent commitment to the values of democracy,\u201d Doctor said. \u201cThe question that we have to continue to ask is: How do we veer out of this potential spiral?\u201d<\/p>\n
In Oklahoma, Pat McFerron, a pollster and GOP consultant, said closed-party primaries in safe districts encourage candidates to use extreme rhetoric. It would be toned down, he argued, in a single open primary.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the candidates I know, in their heart of hearts, are people who want to make a difference ,who prefer an environment that wants consensus,\u201d McFerron said. \u201cIf you\u2019re going to be successful, you have to play the game that\u2019s in front of you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some Republicans \u2014 including vice presidential nominee JD Vance \u2014 quickly blamed Biden and other Democrats for portraying Trump as a threat to democracy. On Facebook, Alabama\u2019s GOP lieutenant governor, Will Ainsworth, held \u201cthe radical left\u201d responsible and said its agenda attacks Christianity and is \u201cevil incarnate.\u201d<\/p>\n
Social media has helped fuel threats. In a 2021 survey of 112 public officials, the National League of Cities found the overwhelming majority \u2014 about 4 in 5 \u2014 experienced harassment, threats or violence. Most said it happened through social media; more than half said it also occurred at public meetings.<\/p>\n
Threats of violence were amplified starting in 2020 with the coronavirus pandemic, as public health officials imposed restrictions. Ohio\u2019s state health director resigned after armed protesters came to her house; the health officer for Orange County, California, quit after weeks of criticism and threats over requiring face coverings in public.<\/p>\n
And Trump\u2019s false narrative that the 2020 election was stolen has spawned threats against local election officials, making some miserable or anxious enough to quit. Many are closely watching the upcoming election.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s hard to imagine there is not an election jurisdiction in the country that now is not on high alert for the potential for political violence in the 2024 election,\u201d said David Levine, a former local election official in Idaho.<\/p>\n
____ Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas; Mulvihill, from Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and Collins from Columbia, South Carolina. Associated Press writers Christina Almeida Cassidy in Atlanta; Joey Cappelletti in Lansing, Michigan; Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City; Matthew Barakat in Springfield, Virginia; Bill Barrow in Milwaukee; Dylan Lovan in Louisville, Kentucky; and Gabe Stern in Carson City, Nevada contributed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The latest headlines from our reporters across the US sent straight to your inbox each weekdayYour briefing on the latest headlines from across the US Long before a would-be assassin wounded former President Donald Trump, the fuse of political violence had been burning across America. Members of Congress have been shot. One lawmaker’s staffers in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3424,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[173],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n