Wichita man indicted over Facebook, hospital comments threatening to kill President Biden

A Wichita man is facing federal charges for allegedly threatening the life of President Joe Biden in Facebook messages in April.

Cody McCormick, 27, also reportedly told U.S. Secret Service agents interviewing him at a local hospital’s mental health facility that he would kidnap the president if he had the chance. “My intent is to kill Joe Biden if I don’t get the help I need,” McCormick said, according to an affidavit attached to an April 27 criminal complaint detailing the accusations and charges.

McCormick was indicted by a grand jury on the charges — three counts of making a threat against the U.S. president — on Tuesday, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Kansas. The indictment alleges he “knowingly and willfully made a threat to take the life of, to kidnap and to inflict bodily harm upon the President of the United States” in violation of federal law.

McCormick’s defense lawyer, James Pratt, declined to comment on the case late Wednesday afternoon. McCormick was arrested on April 27 and is currently in custody at the Sedgwick County Jail pending a May 22 detention hearing, court and jail records show.

If convicted, he faces up to five years in federal prison, up to a $250,000 fine and up to three years of supervised release on each count.

The affidavit included with the criminal complaint gives details about the contents of the Facebook messages beyond what’s mentioned in the indictment. According to it:

Using a Facebook profile that spelled his first name with a “K,” McCormick on April 23 sent a message to the Lane County Sheriff’s Office saying, among things, that he was planning to get an “AR 15 and I will be going to kill Joe Biden.”

In the message, McCormick called Biden “the worst (expletive) president ever” and said that “the country is going to hell because of him” and that “it’s my job to kill and finish him.”

McCormick also suggested in the message that he, too, might die, saying law enforcement, including the FBI and the ATF, “will kill me.”

On the same day, McCormick sent a Facebook message to local TV news station KSN expressing similar threats and opinions about the president’s performance.

“I will get a Greyhound bus ticket and go and shoot him,” that message says. “... I will go end his (expletive) life I promise you.”

He made more statements about planning to kill the president to staff at Ascension Via Christi Hospital St. Joseph on April 23 and told U.S. Secret Service agents who interviewed him the next day at the hospital’s behavioral health center that he would “force” Biden “to step down from office” if he had the opportunity. McCormick also told the agents he would “kidnap him (Biden)” and would “travel as far up as Oregon” to reach him.

Asked whether the Secret Service should worry about McCormick if Biden ever visited Wichita or the surrounding area, McCormick responded: “Yeah.”