White House calls out ‘despicable’ rhetoric fueling attacks
Following the third attempt on President Donald Trump’s life, White House officials are calling for accountability from the media and the Democratic Party, pointing to a ‘crazed’ normalization of rhetoric that radicalizes unstable people and fuels online disinformation. Karoline Leavitt criticized Jimmy Kimmel’s ‘widow’ joke and ‘despicable’ comments from top Democrats as catalysts that inspire mentally disturbed individuals to commit violence.
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A handful of Democratic hopefuls are under scrutiny for comments made before the apparent third assassination attempt against President Donald Trump that appeared to support violence against Republicans.
Political rhetoric, particularly the kind that skews toward violent or aggressive imagery from Democrats, and its role in political violence have time and again come under the microscope during Trump’s second term in office.
After the apparent third assassination attempt against Trump over the weekend, in which alleged shooter Cole Allen was subdued by federal law enforcement during the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in Washington, D.C., the Senate’s campaign arm is putting a spotlight on aggressive comments three hopefuls, Graham Platner, Abdul El-Sayed and former Gov. Roy Cooper, made in the past.
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Senate Democratic hopefuls Graham Platner, Abdul El-Sayed and former North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper are under scrutiny for their past violent rhetoric against Republicans in light of a possible third assassination attempt against President Donald Trump. (Sophie Park/Getty Images; Jim West/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images; AP Photo/Nell Redmond)
National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) spokesperson Bernadette Breslin slammed Democratic candidates running for the Senate for not lowering the temperature, as they once called for, and for not condemning the shooting over the weekend.
“Today’s Democrats are beholden to a Trump-hating base that is dragging their party down a dangerous path,” Breslin told Fox News Digital. “Republicans have consistently made clear that political violence has no place in America, while Democrats’ silence is deafening.”
Calls to tone down the rhetoric reached a zenith after the assassination of political activist Charlie Kirk last year. But that moment has done little to quiet the back-and-forth, particularly on the campaign trail.
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White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt takes questions during the daily press briefing in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House in Washington, D.C., on April 27, 2026. Leavitt addressed reporters about the upcoming White House Correspondents’ dinner. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
Platner, who is running to unseat Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, in a race that could determine control of the Senate, did little to tone down his speech on the heels of Kirk’s assassination.
“I don’t wanna beat Susan Collins, I want to trounce Susan Collins” Platner said at the time during an interview with Meidas Touch. “I want to give the Republican Party a battering.”
Platner’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his past rhetoric or on whether he condemned the shooting.
Just a few weeks later, fellow progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed, who is locked in a contentious three-way Democratic primary vying for outgoing Sen. Gary Peters’, D-Mich., seat, went after Republicans with heated rhetoric.
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President Donald Trump revealed Sunday during an interview on “60 Minutes” that a Democrat asked to hug him in the aftermath of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting. (Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
He put a new spin on a phrase coined years ago by former first lady Michelle Obama during a Fight Oligarchy tour stop run by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., in Michigan.
“When they go low, we don’t go high,” El-Sayed said. “We take them to the mud and choke them out.”
El-Sayed did condemn the shooting in Washington, D.C., and said in a post on X that he was “relieved that no members of the administration, media, staff, or bystanders were hurt,” but his campaign did not comment on his past rhetoric against Republicans.
Former North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, who is running to flip retiring Sen. Thom Tillis’, R-N.C., seat in the upper chamber, blasted Trump as a “threat to democracy” and argued that “defeating him is imperative” during the 2024 presidential cycle.
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A spokesperson for his Senate bid told Fox News Digital that Cooper believed “that political violence of any kind is unacceptable, and he’s grateful to the brave law enforcement members who worked to keep the president and attendees safe on Saturday evening.”
Meanwhile, the White House is pinning the blame for the weekend shooting on Democrats’ far-left base.
“The left wing cult of hatred against the president and all of those who support him and work for him has gotten multiple people hurt and killed, and it almost did so again this weekend,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Monday.
