Donald Trump has been busted for misleading his followers while demanding that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries face charges over the attempted assassination at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
“This lunatic, Hakeem ‘Low IQ’ Jeffries, should be charged with INCITING VIOLENCE!” Trump ranted on Truth Social on Thursday. “The Radical Left Democrats actually want to Destroy our Country.”
His unhinged post included a picture of Jeffries at a press conference days before the attempted shooting on April 25, alongside a screenshot of the security footage of the alleged would-be assassin charging through security at the Washington Hilton three days later.
The captions above each image included “Maximum Warfare” attributed to the New York Democrat and then “Three Days Later” under the larger title “Should Hakeem Jeffries be charged with INCITING VIOLENCE?”
However, the image of Jeffries was taken out of context, and the phrase “maximum warfare” that he used on the Wednesday before the attempted attack can actually be traced back to a Trump White House aide last year.
Just days before the press gala dinner, Jeffries spoke at a press conference about Trump’s push for Republicans to redraw congressional districts in red states across the country to maintain control of the House in the midterms.
Beside him was a poster with an image of Trump along with his top political aide James Blair, with the words “maximum warfare everywhere all the time.” Blair has been a key staffer behind the president’s redistricting push.
The New York Democrat insisted that Democrats would fight the GOP gerrymandering battle with “maximum warfare” in response to the president’s demands that started last year with Texas.
But last August, the New York Times quoted a person it said was “close to the president” who described the White House political strategy as: “Maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time.”
Jeffries appears to have seized verbatim on the quote from that person close to the president. The top Democrat was appearing at a press conference after Virginia voters approved a plan to redraw state maps that would benefit Democrats.
“We are in an era of maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time. And we’re going to keep the pressure on Republicans in every single state in the union to ensure at the end of the day that there is a fair national map because we believe that it’s the people who should decide,” Jeffries said on April 22.
Trump’s post also ignored the fact that the would-be shooter booked his room at the Washington Hilton well before Jeffries’ press conference that Trump used in his post, according to the Justice Department’s own evidence.
Jeffries fired back at Trump’s demand with a post on X on Thursday, writing: “The Knicks are up 2-0 and I have to wake up to another deranged rant from this guy. Gas prices are sky high, grocery bills are surging and families can’t catch a break. Democrats are about to take back the House and you’re losing your mind. Where’s the luv?”
The president’s demand that Jeffries now face charges comes after White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also unleashed a nasty attack on Democrats just days after the shooting attempt.
She blamed Democrats’ political rhetoric for the attempted assassination from the White House press briefing room. She also specifically called out Jeffries’ quote.
Jeffries blasted Leavitt in response as a “stone-cold liar” and told her to “get lost.”
“Clean up your own house before you have anything to say to us about the language that we use,” he said at the time.
