On Monday evening, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) published a lengthy X post in which he criticized the media and the Democratic Party for their rhetoric both prior to and following the second assassination attempt on the life of former President Donald Trump over the weekend.
Vance made the comments following the arrest of 58-year-old Ryan Routh, a Democrat donor with a criminal history that prohibited him from possessing firearms, by authorities in Florida on Sunday.
Routh had concealed himself on the Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach for 12 hours while equipped with an AK-47.
The political Left’s rhetoric, according to Vance, Trump’s vice presidential running companion, has gotten “out of control.”
“Here is what we know so far: Kamala Harris has said that ‘Democracy is on the line’ in her race against President Trump. The gunman agreed, and used the exact same phrase. He had a Kamala Harris bumper sticker on his truck,” Vance wrote.
“He was obsessed with Ukraine’s ‘fight for Democracy’ and absorbed many unhinged views about the Russia-Ukraine war. His name is Ryan Routh, and he donated 19 times to Democrat causes and zero to Republican ones.” he continued.
“How do you think the Democrats and their media allies would respond if a 19-time Republican donor tried to kill a Democratic official? It’s a question that answers itself. For years, Kamala Harris’s campaign surrogates have said things like ‘Trump has to be eliminated.’ And how have their media allies responded to the second assassination attempt on Donald Trump in as many months?” he added.
Yesterday, Donald J. Trump nearly lost his life. An armed gunman waited for him in the bushes. He brought a go-pro camera to record it. A secret service agent spotted the barrel of a gun through a fence and shot at the gunman. The gunman fled. He was caught. And now we slowly…
— JD Vance (@JDVance) September 16, 2024
“NBC News called the attempted assassination a ‘golf club incident.’ The LA Times told us ‘Trump Targeted at Golf Club.’ The USA Today’s top of the fold headline is ‘Hope in America,’ and they published a preposterous letter to the editor arguing that Trump ‘brings these assassination attempts on himself.’ CNN’s Dana Bash–who just yesterday bizarrely accused me of inciting a bomb threat–said today that Harris campaign rhetoric didn’t motivate Routh even though he echoed their rhetoric explicitly.” he remarked.
“PBS’s weekend show perfectly illustrates the double standard of Kamala Harris’s media friends. After spending 30 seconds on the second assassination attempt on President Trump, they then focused on the real danger: me and President Trump, who are, according to them, personally responsible for bomb threats against Springfield. Of course, I repeatedly condemned those threats. And reports today suggest they came from a foreign country, not–as the media suggested–a deranged Trump fan.” Vance continued on.
“Reject censorship and you reject political violence. Embrace censorship, and you will inevitably embrace violence on its behalf. The reason is simple. The logic of censorship leads directly to one place, for there is only one way to permanently silence a human being: put a bullet in his brain.” Vance later concluded at the end of his lengthy post.
[READ MORE: Vance Responds To Dems Downplaying Second Assassination Attempt]
