Former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe said Wednesday on CNN’s “News Central” that former President Donald Trump’s “own rhetoric targeting” people “has an encouraging impact on people who are prone to violence.”
Discussing an armed Utah man accused of making violent threats against President Joe Biden being killed by FBI agents Wednesday, anchor Kate Bolduan said, “He had been under investigation for months. They had been, you know, been to meet with him at least once before. And what do you think was, I’ll call it the last straw, but what led the FBI to execute this search warrant at this time? Was it the fact that Biden was coming to Utah nearby?”
McCabe said, “I expect it was. what you see here is like a consistent pattern of escalation. You know, I think the experience of sending the agents out to his house is particularly instructive. They go out there just to talk to him, to get a sense of this guy, to find out, is he really planning something or is this all bluster.”
He added, “I’m confident that the multiple cases, investigations, what will ultimately be trials of Donald Trump, will continue to really fire up the most extreme portion of his supporters. You know, he also made threats about Letitia James, made threats about Gavin Newsom, who is a very kind of, outspoken Trump critic. And let’s be clear, President Trump’s own rhetoric targeting these people, showing his supporters who he dislikes, airing out his own grievances, that has an encouraging impact on people who are prone to violence. It’s reckless to engage in that sort of speech, but that’s what former President Trump does.”
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