WASHINGTON – The Michigan attorney-general yesterday charged a US man with crimes for threatening to kill President Joe Biden, top House Democrat Nancy Pelosi and state Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
In January, Joshua Doctor, 21, allegedly posted “multiple threatening comments” on the iFunny social media platform, attorney-general Dana Nessel said in a statement.
In those posts, Doctor said he would use a gun to shoot and kill the elected officials, which he claimed would be “the catalyst” for a new American revolution.
The statement also said Doctor’s smartphone had information on how to make a bomb and where to find the necessary material.
Doctor, who turned himself in yesterday, is charged with threatening an act of terrorism and using a computer to commit a crime, both felonies carrying potential sentences of 20 years.
His first appearance before a judge is scheduled for April 8.
The US government in late January issued an anti-terrorism alert focused for the first time on the threat posed by “extremists” to Biden’s presidency.
In his inauguration speech on January 20, Biden vowed to “defeat” the “rise of political extremism, white supremacy” and “domestic terrorism”.
Two weeks earlier, on January 6, hundreds of supporters of former president Donald Trump, including members of radical groups, attacked the US Capitol building in Washington in an attempt to prevent the validation of the results of the presidential election that saw Biden beat Trump in November.
In October 2020, Whitmer was the target of a small far-right group that planned to abduct her, angry at her coronavirus lockdown measures. – AFP, March 17, 2021
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