Rep. Zoe Lofgren Says Trump's Attacks On FBI Could 'Potentially' Be Incitement
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Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) said Sunday that Donald Trump’s brazen, repeated attacks on the FBI could “potentially” be considered incitement of violence against the agency and agents.
CNN’s Jim Acosta pressed Lofgren on whether she considered it incitement when Trump blasted the FBI and Justice Department as “vicious monsters” at his Pennsylvania rally Saturday night.
“Potentially, yes,” responded Lofgren, who’s a member of the House Jan. 6 panel investigating last year’s insurrection. “In the lead-up to January 6th there were extravagant claims made meant to inflame public opinion, and that is what is happening here.”
“I think it’s meant to turn people against law enforcement officers,” Lofgren said. “And we’ve seen that sometimes that rhetoric reaches people who are prepared to act on it.“
This is “not responsible, and the ex-president ought to stop it,” Lofgren added. “Meanwhile, all of us, Democrats and Republicans in elected office, should call this out. This is not proper behavior.”
Trump has repeatedly bashed the FBI, calling it a “criminal enterprise,” as well as “corrupt,” “sleazy” and abusive.
Following FBI agents’ confiscation of classified documents last month that Trump took from the White House when he left office and stashed at his Mar-a-Lago resort, Trump claimed that the bureau had a “long and unrelenting history of being corrupt.”
He also called the search a “sneak attack on democracy,” and referred in a Truth Social post to “great simmering anger” among the public over the action, which he characterized as a “break in.”
Officials reported a spike in threats against the FBI after Trump’s remarks. A joint intelligence bulletin released by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security advised federal officials to remain vigilant and stay informed about domestic violent extremists.
In the first eruption of violence last month, gunman Ricky Shiffer, armed with an AR-15 assault rifle, was killed in a shootout with police after he attempted to breach a Cincinnati FBI office amid the vicious social media attacks by Republican lawmakers and their supporters.
Shiffer frequently posted violent messages on Trump’s Truth Social platform and appeared to be particularly triggered by verbal attacks, led by the former president, on the FBI.
The FBI Agents Association, which represents 14,000 current and past special agents, issued an angry statement in August saying that “calls for violence against law enforcement are unacceptable, and should be condemned by all leaders.”
Larry Cosme, president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, expressed alarm in an interview with The Washington Post over GOP warnings to Americans that federal agents are “coming for you.”
The “rank-and-file officers on the street and agents, they are career employees that … cherish the Constitution like the average American,” Cosme said. “For them to be attacked ... is shameful and disgusting.”
Check out Lofgren’s full CNN interview here:
This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
