Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr. sound convinced that there’s some kind of media conspiracy to suppress stories about violence from ostensibly left-wing individuals, but this conspiracy simply does not exist. In a Sunday Twitter post, Ivanka bemoaned the supposed “near total silence” from the media on the issue of ostensibly left-wing perpetration of violence — but this near total silence is a fiction! The media has covered all sorts of politically-tinged violence, and President-elect Joe Biden himself has repeatedly unequivocally condemned violence in all forms. Notably, in their weekend complaints, Ivanka and Donald Jr. failed to mention the obvious right-wing street violence.
Ivanka tweeted the following stunningly tone-deaf message:
‘The media’s near total silence about the physical violence being perpetrated against conservatives is shameful & dangerous. Just [imagine] the outrage and indignation if this went the other way. Violence is never the answer and instigators must be condemned and prosecuted.’
Again — there’s no media blackout of stories of ostensibly left-wing violence. Ivanka is misrepresenting reality. The top of The Washington Post‘s on-the-scene coverage of weekend protests in D.C. covered the violence from both sides who were present.
Also — the violence does go the “other way”! In D.C. over the weekend, the violent far-right hate group known as the Proud Boys was among the demonstration participants, and at one point, the Proud Boys proclaimed their intention of “cleaning the city tonight,” which sounds like an obvious threat of violence against their opponents. A slew of violent confrontations unfolded throughout the night, egged on by social media posts from Proud Boy leaders. These developments are not secret. A video showing the Proud Boys proclaiming their intention of “cleaning the city” had been viewed over a quarter of a million times as of Sunday morning. Ivanka and Donald Jr. are pretending like this right-wing violence simply doesn’t exist.
“We’re not done cleaning the city tonight, let’s go.” The Proud Boys, along with a group of several hundred Trump supporters, prepare to mobilize here tonight #DC #MarchForTrump #DCProtests pic.twitter.com/1howLvbbh3
— Brendan Gutenschwager (@BGOnTheScene) November 15, 2020
Trump Jr. tweeted the following unhinged message on Sunday morning:
‘The media’s silence on the violence against Trump supporters is deafening. After four years of calling them Nazis, at this point they might as well just dox them all or add the to AOC’s lists for the Gulags. They are complicit in the violence. They are the worst of the worst.’
He’s misrepresenting reality. The media has simply not been silent on ostensibly left-wing violence — isolated incidents of violent rioting that erupted during recent protests were, for instance, well-covered. Neither has “the media” spent four years “calling [Trump supporters] Nazis.” That claim just isn’t true. As for the AOC reference — recently, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said that Trump-supporting Republicans’ social media posts should be saved so that in the future they can’t pretend like they somehow valiantly opposed Trumpism. Unhinged right-wingers have characterized this very basic mundane call for accountability as some kind of creeping authoritarianism, which is just nuts.
Check out Twitter’s response below:
