Trump Spread False Information About Brown Shooting. That’s a Problem |
President Donald Trump spread unconfirmed information about an active shooter at Brown University, potentially putting students’ lives in danger as they sheltered in place during the event.
On Saturday evening at around 4 p.m., a man entered a classroom with about 60 students and started shooting. The students were in a final exam review session for their Economics class. Two people were killed in the attack, and nine were injured.
On Saturday night, as students barricaded themselves inside dorms and libraries, Trump posted on Truth Social that “the suspect is in custody.”
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But this was not confirmed.
At 5:53 p.m., according to the Brown Daily Herald, Brown’s student newspaper, the department of public safety sent out an alert saying that the “situation remains ongoing.”
Trump posted at 5:44 p.m., writing that he had been “briefed” on the shooting and that a suspect was in custody.
Then, at 6:03 p.m., he retracted his statement, posting again on Truth Social that the police had reversed their previous statement.
Social media users and students pushed back on Trump’s characterization. One student posted, “I am at brown university they have not confirmed a shooter in custody please do not believe trump and stay inside.”
In a press conference later that night, Providence Mayor Brett Smiley also urged caution: “There is a lot of misinformation that can spread.… If it did not come from an official channel, it is not official.”
As of Sunday morning, the Providence police have a suspect in custody, multiple outlets report.
President Donald Trump’s Truth Social rants may be unhinged, but they have serious consequences: His violent rhetoric has spurred threats against nearly two dozen elected officials on both sides of the aisle.
According to a new tally by NBC News, Trump’s posts over the last few weeks have led to threats on a number of Democrats—but even more Republicans, including over a dozen Indiana state lawmakers, who the president was attempting to bully into voting for his gerrymandering scheme.
Democrats who have been threatened include senators Chuck Schumer and Elissa Slotkin, as well as the other five lawmakers who, along with Slotkin, Trump accused of sedition. On the Republican side, soon-to-be-former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has been vocal about the threats she’s received since criticizing the president’s agenda, and over a dozen Indiana state senators have also received threats after being named out by Trump on Truth Social.
Meanwhile, Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, said that Trump hasn’t done anything wrong.
“As the survivor of two assassination attempts—and recently watching his dear friend Charlie be assassinated—no one understands the dangers of political violence more than President Trump,” Jackson said in a statement to NBC.
“But President Trump, and the entire Administration, will not hesitate to speak the truth and call out Democrats for smearing their opponents as Nazis, encouraging members of the military to ignore lawful orders, and enabling violent criminals to invade our country. Sharing these facts is not inciting violence and the media would be wrong to make such an accusation,” she added.
Who’s going to tell her that the majority of the people receiving threats were Republicans?
President Donald Trump raged against ISIS and said the U.S. would retaliate after an attack in Syria on Saturday, possibly laying the groundwork for more American military involvement in another country in the Middle East.
Earlier in the day, a lone gunman shot and killed two U.S. Army soldiers and a civilian interpreter while they were conducting counterterrorism operations in Palmyra, a city in the central part of the country, various outlets reported. The shooter was killed, and three other members of the U.S. military and two Syrians were injured.
U.S. Central Command called the attack the “result of an ambush by a lone ISIS gunman,” though no group has claimed responsibility for the attack as of yet. More details are still emerging, but Trump took to Truth Social to declare there would be a response.
“This was an ISIS attack against the U.S., and Syria, in a very dangerous part of Syria, that is not fully controlled by them. The President of Syria, Ahmed al-Sharaa, is extremely angry and disturbed by this attack,” he wrote. “There will be very serious retaliation.”
What, exactly, that response might look like is unclear. This is reportedly the first case of U.S. deaths in Syria since Bashar Al-Assad’s regime fell, and the attack is under investigation.
Defense Secretery Pete........