Early Saturday morning, June 14th, 2025–the morning of Trump’s birthday gift to himself in the form of a military parade–Minnesota State Representative Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark were murdered in their Brooklyn Park home by a gunman impersonating a police officer. Seven miles away in Champlin, Senator John Hoffman and his wife were shot multiple times and barely survived what Governor Tim Walz called “a politically motivated assassination.”

The killer left behind a manifesto listing other Democratic officials. Police found it in his abandoned vehicle—a catalog of targets that reads like a direct transcription of Donald Trump’s political hit list.

This wasn’t random violence.

This was the inevitable result of Trump’s systematic campaign to turn language into a weapon of political warfare. For nearly a decade, Trump has been running what amounts to a terrorist recruitment operation, using mass media to produce lone-wolf killers who will do his dirty work while keeping his own hands clean.

The Minnesota murders prove the operation is working exactly as designed.

The Rhetoric Factory

Trump didn’t stumble into violent language—he engineered it. Since 2015, he has systematically escalated his rhetoric, testing which formulations produce the most violent responses from his followers.

Every rally, every tweet, every interview functions as a laboratory experiment in political terrorism.

The progression is unmistakable, and it’s been happening right in front of us. It started with “Lock her up!” chants against Hillary Clinton, establishing that political opposition equals criminality. Then it escalated to describing immigrants as “vermin” who “poison the blood” of America—language lifted directly from Nazi propaganda.

By 2024? Trump was routinely promising “retribution” against his enemies and describing political opponents as “human scum” who deserve elimination.

Watch the pattern. Each escalation tests slightly more extreme boundaries while maintaining just enough ambiguity to avoid prosecution. Trump has perfected what terrorism scholars call “stochastic terrorism”—using mass media to provoke random acts of violence that are statistically predictable but individually unpredictable.

The genius of this approach is its plausible deniability. When violence occurs, Trump claims he meant something else entirely. He’s not directly ordering anyone to kill Democrats—he’s just creating the psychological conditions where killing Democrats appears not only justified but necessary.

Manufacturing Killers

What Trump has built is a systematic process for transforming ordinary Americans into political assassins.

The process follows a recognizable pattern that fascist movements have used throughout history. However, Trump’s innovation is achieved through mass media rather than secret party meetings.

First comes demonization. Trump tells his followers that Democrats are stealing their country, destroying their way of life, and threatening their children. Political opponents aren’t fellow citizens with different ideas—they’re existential enemies who must be stopped.

Next comes dehumanization. Democrats aren’t really human; they’re “vermin,” “animals,” “enemies of the people.” This language strips away the psychological barriers that typically prevent people from committing violence against other human beings.

Then comes desensitization through repetition. Trump’s violent vocabulary has increased exponentially since 2016. What once seemed shocking becomes normal. References to “bloodbaths” and “termination” of enemies become standard rally fare.

Finally comes authorization.

Trump doesn’t explicitly order violence, but he creates the unmistakable impression that violence carries his approval. When his followers commit acts of political terrorism, he calls them “patriots” and promises to pardon them.

The Minnesota killer didn’t misunderstand Trump’s message—he understood it perfectly. Trump had spent years telling him that Democratic legislators represent mortal threats requiring violent elimination.

The killer simply took the logical next step.

The Legal Shield

Why can’t law enforcement stop this terrorist recruitment operation?

Because Trump has exploited a fatal flaw in American free speech law.

The legal standard for prosecuting incitement, established in Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969), requires that speech be directed at producing “imminent lawless action.” But stochastic terrorism operates precisely through the absence of imminence. Trump’s power lies in the temporal gap between his words and the resulting violence—the space that allows legal immunity while maintaining deadly effectiveness.

Other democracies that have experienced fascist movements don’t make this mistake. German law criminalizes speech that attacks human dignity or incites hatred against groups, regardless of timing. The country learned from experience that fascist rhetoric doesn’t need to be immediately followed by violence to be lethally dangerous.

American law, shaped by different historical experiences, remains vulnerable to systematic linguistic assault.

Here’s the bitter irony: Trump has proven that democracy’s greatest strength—its openness to all viewpoints—can be weaponized against itself through sophisticated manipulation of free speech protections.

The Assassination Network

The Minnesota murders weren’t isolated incidents—they’re part of a broader pattern of Trump-inspired political violence that has been building for years.

Think about it. The January 6th Capitol attack demonstrated that Trump’s rhetoric could produce mass revolutionary violence. The plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer showed how his words translated into specific assassination plans. The threats against election workers, judges, and prosecutors revealed the systematic nature of the intimidation campaign.

Each incident generated crucial intelligence for refining the process.

Trump learned which formulations elicit the most violent responses, which targets garner the most support from his base, and which tactics minimize legal consequences. It’s been a years-long R&D project in domestic terrorism.

The killer in Minnesota represents the maturation of this experimental process. His manifesto, listing additional Democratic officials, suggests a systematic targeting rather than random political rage. His impersonation of law enforcement reveals how deeply Trump’s rhetoric had penetrated his psychology—he understood himself as acting with legitimate authority to enforce a higher law.

The Corporate Media’s Role

Trump’s terrorist recruitment operation couldn’t function without the eager collaboration of corporate media outlets that amplify his message for profit.

Every time CNN, MSNBC, or Fox News broadcasts Trump’s latest violent threat, they’re functioning as recruitment platforms for potential assassins. Media executives know exactly what they’re doing—violent Trump rhetoric generates massive ratings and advertising revenue.

They’ve calculated that the profits from broadcasting terrorist propaganda outweigh the risks of the resulting violence.

The media’s favorite defense is that they’re simply “reporting the news.” However, there’s nothing neutral about choosing to amplify threats against specific individuals to millions of audiences. When media outlets broadcast Trump’s hit lists disguised as political commentary, they become active participants in the assassination machinery.

Blood money. That’s what it is.

The Class War Behind the Violence

This isn’t really about Trump’s personality or mental state—it’s about how ruling elites use violence when democratic processes threaten their interests.

Trump represents a faction of American capital that has concluded democracy is incompatible with maintaining their wealth and power. Rather than accept electoral defeat, they’ve chosen to destroy democratic institutions through systematic violence and intimidation.

The Minnesota murders serve specific class interests. They send a clear message to any politician who might challenge corporate power: oppose us, and you’ll end up like Melissa Hortman. The goal isn’t just to kill individual Democrats—it’s to terrorize the entire political class into submission.

This explains why law enforcement response has been so inadequate. Police and prosecutors understand that Trump’s violent rhetoric serves the interests of the same ruling class that funds their operations. Going after Trump too aggressively would mean challenging the fundamental power structure that employs them.

Fighting Back

The Minnesota murders make clear that we’re not dealing with normal political opposition—we’re facing a fascist movement that has declared war on democracy itself. Responding to this threat requires abandoning illusions about “civility” and “bipartisanship.”

Democratic politicians who continue treating Trump as a legitimate political opponent rather than a terrorist leader are endangering their own lives and the lives of their colleagues. Every time they appear on stage with Republicans who amplify Trump’s violent rhetoric, they’re legitimizing the very forces trying to murder them.

What’s needed instead is systematic resistance to the entire fascist infrastructure. This means not just opposing Trump but dismantling the media networks that amplify his message, the financial networks that fund his operations, and the political networks that provide him cover.

It means recognizing that political violence is not a bug in the American system—it’s a feature. The same ruling class that profits from endless foreign wars has simply turned its violence apparatus toward domestic political control.

Most importantly, it means understanding that electoral politics alone cannot stop a movement that has abandoned democratic norms entirely. When fascists start systematically murdering elected officials, the appropriate response isn’t better campaign strategies—it’s organized resistance by any means necessary.

The Minnesota murders mark a new phase in America’s slide toward fascism. The question now is whether democratic forces will respond with adequate seriousness to the mortal threat they face, or whether they’ll continue sleepwalking toward their own destruction.

Words are killing people. It’s time to start taking them seriously.

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