Many Democrats Retreat into Conspiracy Theories

If you were thinking that maybe this weekend’s attempted assassination would lead to some introspection from Democrats, you were wrong. All you have to do is go to a place where Democrats are struggling to make sense of what happened and it’s clear introspection isn’t on the menu. What does seem to have an appeal to some Democrats is victim blaming and suggestions that the whole thing was staged.

The Washington Post published a story yesterday which does a decent job of portraying the (alleged) shooter as someone who disliked Trump who was intent of violence. Here’s how it opens.

He identified himself in a missive sent to family members moments before the attack as a “friendly federal assassin” and railed against Trump administration policies. He booked a hotel room at the Washington Hilton weeks in advance, then traveled by train from his home outside Los Angeles to Chicago and then to D.C.

Anyone reading this would find it hard to escape the obvious conclusion that this was a politically motivated assassination attempt.

So far, the suspect had refused to cooperate with investigators, Blanche said. But interviews with family members as well as writings recovered from Allen’s home outside Los Angeles and the hotel room he booked at the Washington Hilton contributed to a growing confidence among authorities that his attack was politically motivated.

“It does appear that he did in fact set out to target folks in the administration, likely including the president,” Blanche said during an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press.”…

Minutes before Saturday’s shooting, Allen sent a message to his family apologizing for what he said he was about to do…

Though the message did not mention Trump by name or specifically detail plans to attempt to assassinate the president, its author expressed sharp criticism of his administration and said that he was no longer willing to permit a “traitor to coat my hands with his crime.”…

The letter said he intended to target administration officials “prioritized from highest-ranking to lowest” — “not including [FBI Director Kash] Patel,” who was in attendance at the Saturday event.

The rest of the article includes comments from neighbors and former teachers and students who remember him as a normal guy. But none of the that changes what he did or tried to do.

The comments left on this story, more than 3,000 of them, are a different story. Comments at the Post can be upvoted or downvoted by readers so you get an idea of what this particular left-leaning group of readers wants to hear and what they don’t want to hear. For instance:

God is protecting President Trump from Democrats.

That one shows a tally of -77, which means it has been downvoted at least that many times. It could be many more because the tally includes upvotes as well. The -77 is just the current sum of positive upvotes and negative downvotes.

Here’s another that Post readers didn’t like.

The left has turned to violence to get their way. We can no longer afford to elect democrats to public office and risk losing our democracy. [-121]

Is there a pattern here? Not according to Post readers:

With the horrific assassination of Charlie Kirk and now three attempts on our President’s life, it’s time that the Democrats tone down their vile attacks on Trump, and conservatives more broadly. Their constant rhetoric feeds their more easily influenced voters. This left wing political violence needs to end now before more innocent people are killed! [-77]

There are more like this but they all get downvoted:

This is not a “both sides” problem. Democrats shot Trump in Butler PA. They assassinated Charlie Kirk. They murdered the United Health CEO. They tried to assassinate Brett Kavanaugh. They shot Steve Scalise on the baseball field. They firebombed the home of PA Gov Shapiro. And they tried to shoot Trump a 3rd time. The Democrat Party is a violent organization. [-80]

What is getting upvotes are comments like this:

Oh no. We’ll probably get another picture of Trump posing as Jesus [76]

People feel sorry for the shooter.

I hate to see a young person throw his or her life away on an inept attempt to cause harm to anyone, even Donald. [87]

Others are suggesting no one should trust the official story.

No educated human being believes anything coming from this regime. Famous for touting “preliminary,” unfounded “evidence,” then it all crashes down. But trust me, they will try to fabricate what happened. They have to give TACO another unfounded win so as to win over his TACO turncoat MAGAs. He’s polling at 30%…and not just because of the [Iran] War. Just like he used the Butler incident to generate votes for his “second coming as the Anti-Christ.” [72]

Another one:

If you believe this was real, you also believe that Donnie’s ear grew back magically in 2024. [64]

I could keep going.

Not a word of the Iran war or Epstein files in WaPo today. The diversion works. [18]

Not too long ago I had a discussion about Trump with a Democrat I know. At some point I mentioned that Trump had survived two assassination attempts and this person made it very clear they didn’t believe those had really happened. I pointed out that someone in the audience behind Trump had died and that there was a photo showing a bullet flying behind his head. This person was convinced Trump had faked an injury.

All that to say, I’ve seen this before in person. I suspect a surprising percentage of Democrats believe something like this about one or more of the assassination attempts against Trump. So it’s not surprise to see it again after the latest one. The coping is not going well.

🚨 WOW! President Trump just WENT HARD against anyone claiming the attempted assassination was “STAGED”

“They’re more SICK than they are con people!”

“Yeah, and Oct. 7 didn’t happen, and World War II didn’t happen, and the Holocaust didn’t happen, and many things didn’t… pic.twitter.com/zZTidU4lBx

— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) April 27, 2026

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