On this past Saturday evening, 55-year-old Angela Marie Conijn shot and killed a woman after the victim allegedly attempted to take Conijn’s pro-Trump yard sign. The incident unfolded in the 5 o’clock hour in Mount Vernon, Washington, where the Skagit County Sheriff’s Office received two calls in rapid succession describing the situation. In the first call, local authorities were informed of a fight — and in the second call, someone who was on the scene told authorities that their friend had been shot. The victim, who was 32 years old, was dead when authorities arrived, and Conijn has been charged with second-degree murder.
As summarized by a Fox affiliate, local authorities say that “the victim and shooter didn’t know each other but they determined that the incident began over the theft of a political sign.” Authorities did not themselves release information about the sign, but that Fox affiliate reports that “other residents, reacting to the crime on a local message board, say the woman had a Trump sign in the yard and the victim tried to take it.” Besides Conijn’s arrest, her husband was also arrested and charged with assault, and authorities say that their investigation is ongoing.
This kind of demented violence is what Trumpism has wrought in the United States. Just this Wednesday, during an interview on Fox that was his first interview in weeks, Trump reiterated the delusional lie that the 2020 presidential election had been rigged for Joe Biden, an idea that never received any substantive support from any credible governmental authority anywhere in the country. When certain Republicans attempted to bring their supposed case to court, they failed — no court ever accepted the idea, which nevertheless inspired the rioters at the Capitol on January 6. No matter these facts, Trump is continuing to spread this dangerous garbage.
Trump has consistently refused to acknowledge any issues with his behavior. Instead, he just keeps repeatedly insisting that his actions have been entirely appropriate — even after the death toll connected to his rhetoric grew, again, at the recent Capitol rioting. Other related casualties include the almost two dozen people who lost their lives at the hands of a gunman in El Paso, Texas, who used anti-immigrant rhetoric that directly mirrored Trump’s own remarks.
