Two assassination attempts. Two.
Not since President Gerald Ford had two attempts on his life in 1975 has our nation broached similar territory.
How extraordinary—and appallingly sad—that another column on a second assassination attempt is warranted.
There was, after all, an attempted assassination on the life of former President Donald Trump back on July 13. The media may have moved on from this already, but a little more than two months ago, our nation came within millimeters of uncharted political territory.
This all speaks to the current chaos and volatility of our political moment. It comes down to the temptation to normalize the exceptional. We are living in an incredibly historical moment. It is hard to know when one is living in history while in the present tense. But let me assure you, we are. In the last three months, we have had as much political instability injected into our political ferment as anything in recent American history. A sitting president stepped away from a reelection campaign after a horrendous debate appearance. Then came the first assassination attempt. A historically unpopular and untested vice president was anointed by the Democratic Party as the second coming of Barack Obama while avoiding any substantive interaction with the press. Now, a second assassination attempt.
It is all too much to take in and process. But one thing can be said of the political moment, and one thing in particular that is relevant to Sunday’s assassination attempt: We need more caution, more of what the Bible calls “sober-mindedness” (1 Peter 5:8; 2 Timothy 4:5).
We need a jolt of restraint, particularly regarding our speech. This applies to both sides, but let me address one phrase that appears in the would-be assassin’s rhetoric.
Since Sunday’s news broke, we’ve learned of the alleged assassin’s political leanings, particularly from his X account. By all reports, Ryan Wesley Routh looks like a disturbed man. But disturbed men are particularly susceptible to political capture. The discerning among us will observe that Routh replied on X to President Joe Biden with the following (on an X account that’s now suspended): “@POTUS Your campaign should be called something like KADAF. Keep America democratic and free. Trumps should be MASA … make Americans slaves again master. DEMOCRACY is on the ballot and we cannot lose. We cannot afford to fail. The world is counting on us to show the way.”
“Democracy is on the ballot” is, by now, a well-worn phrase used and reused by Democrats against Trump’s candidacy. To be clear, Trump has been reckless at times in his meandering statements about the American experiment. From calling for the suspension of the Constitution to his continued 2020 election denials, he does himself no favors to wave off concerns about his post-constitutional rhetoric. Still, when Democrats and the corporate media spend hours upon hours injecting anxiety and panic into the population, can we not see a link to the fact that two attempts have been undertaken to stop Trump’s candidacy? After all, if Trump is a would-be tyrant, a “threat to democracy,” or a “dictator,” as some on the left frame him, aren’t drastic actions necessary? It is impossible to speak irresponsibly and expect rational behavior from a population as large as ours.
The problem with all of the “democracy is on the ballot” talk, however, is that it assumes that half the country who does not want to vote for Democrats is an existential threat to the United States. That level of rhetoric, along with the accumulated fever swamps of political theater, can add up to combustible moments like what transpired on Sunday when a deranged individual bought into it. You don’t have to vote for Trump or even like him, but if you cannot see why half the country would vote for him rather than Kamala Harris, let me suggest that maybe you aren’t practicing democratic virtues yourself.
Surely, this will cause us to self-examine where our rhetoric is taking us, right? Let us be sober-minded and reflect upon James 3:6: “And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell.”
