President Donald Trump is openly endorsing the behavior of some of his Texas supporters who recently surrounded a Biden campaign bus and attempted to run it off the road. During the incident, the Trump supporters — at least some of whom were reportedly armed — moved their own vehicles into position around a Biden campaign bus while it was moving down a Texas highway. One of the Trump supporters’ trucks hit a Biden staffer’s car, leaving significant and visible damage. Reportedly, the FBI is looking into the incident — but in a Monday morning tweet, Trump seemed to claim that the FBI is not investigating the incident and insisted that his supporters had done “nothing wrong.”
There’s not any particular reason to take the president at his word, since he has lied so many times in the past. Early Monday, he tweeted the following message in response to a post revealing the apparent FBI investigation:
‘This story is FALSE. They did nothing wrong. But the ANTIFA Anarchists, Rioters and Looters, who have caused so much harm and destruction in Democrat run cities, are being seriously looked at!’
This story is FALSE. They did nothing wrong. But the ANTIFA Anarchists, Rioters and Looters, who have caused so much harm and destruction in Democrat run cities, are being seriously looked at! https://t.co/3pmbMllPWS
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 2, 2020
It’s not exactly reassuring for the president to be openly endorsing physical harassment and intimidation of his political opponents in the final lead-up to Election Day. Trump has repeatedly ranted and raved about “ANTIFA Anarchists, Rioters and Looters,” trying to tie recent isolated instances of violence to Democratic politicians, but these claims of a connection are baseless. Democratic leaders, including Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, have repeatedly unequivocally condemned violence like rioting and looting. Meanwhile, Trump attempts to use incidents of violence for his political advantage.
At a late Sunday rally in Florida, which actually stretched until after midnight local time, Trump claimed that his supporters in Texas simply “escorted” the Biden campaign bus, but this rhetoric is a brazen misrepresentation of the situation. The suggestion that the Trump supporters were simply behaving innocuously and wanted to help the bus on its way is a lie. That is not what happened.
Nevertheless, Trump said the following:
‘They had the thing with these, really, I’d say very good people. They were riding along the highway, and you had Sleepy Joe’s bus. So they escorted the bus & the radical left said, ‘oh what a horrible thing that is to escort the bus.’ They don’t tell you about Antifa. They go around burning down your cities, Democrat-run, only Democrat-run.’
Again — suggesting that Democratic leaders ignore any kind of violence is a lie. Biden has repeatedly condemned violence in all its forms. Watch Trump claim otherwise in the video below:
"They had the thing with these, really, I'd say very good people. They were riding along the highway, & you had sleepy Joe's bus. So they escorted the bus & the radical left said, 'oh what a horrible thing.' They don't tell you about antifa"– Trump glorifies mob violence pic.twitter.com/frVvr2E9ui
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 2, 2020
Check out Twitter’s response below:
