Trump was nicked in the ear in a failed assassination attempt in Pennsylvania during an electoral campaing event | Credit: Gene J. Puskar/AP
A Virginia judge ordered the arrest of a former US Coast Guard lieutenant who received sharpshooting skills awards for allegedly levelling violent death threats against President Donald Trump. The detainee is due in court today, Wednesday, but has not yet entered a plea, according to several news outlets.
FBI Director Kash Patel took to social media to condemn Peter Stinson, a resident of Oakton, Virginia, who served as a US Coast Guard officer until 2021. He also worked as an instructor for the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Incident Command Systems, according to court records, as reported by Fox News.
Patel claimed Stinson is partially the result of former FBI Director James Comey’s alleged threats against Trump. “This is a guy who threatened President Trump’s life using the ‘86 47’ language – the exact kind of copycat law enforcement is now frequently dealing with after former Director Comey’s destructive Instagram debacle,” Patel said of Stinson, charged with making threats to kill the president.
‘This was predictable’
“Tragically, this case was predictable,” Patel told Fox News Digital regarding Stinson’s alleged threats. Comey is not currently under investigation for the post and has said that neither he nor his wife, who was with him at the time, believed it had any nefarious meaning.
In Stinson’s case, US prosecutors said he has self-identified as a member of the anti-fascist movement known as Antifa.
In April of 2020 prosecutors say Stinson responded to a post from an X user saying “somebody ought sue [Trump’s] a** off” by saying, “somebody ought to do more than sue the orange mf’s a**” before adding, “it involves a rifle and a scope, but I can’t talk about it here.”
Death threats on social media
“I’d be willing to pitch in $100 for a contract. Who wants to join me?” Stinson said. “We could solve the solvable part of this problem in a crack. Then, we can focus on the coronavirus itself.”
The 19-page FBI affidavit against Stinson cites numerous other examples of Stinson replying to users with threatening language, suggesting he would “pull the trigger” to get rid of Trump or would be the “driver” if someone else were willing to assassinate him.
Trump faced two assassination attempts last year, including one in Pennsylvania, where a young man climbed on the roof of a shack near where Trump was delivering a speech and shot him in the ear, causing vast panic amongst those present. Later, a man was detained by the US Secret Service, hidden in a bush with a view of Trump at his Mar-a-Lago golf course.
CBS News said threats against politicians and public officials have grown more common in recent years, authorities say, ranging from members of Congress to judges and prosecutors.
Other violent threats
On June 16th, Patel reposted an FBI Atlanta X post about the arrest of a “26-year-old Duluth man for making violent threats against US Senators Ted Cruz and Deb Fischer.”
Robert Davis Forney, 25, of Duluth, Georgia, was arraigned before a United States Magistrate Judge on federal charges of communicating threats, the Justice Department said in a press release. “Forney was indicted by a federal grand jury seated in the Northern District of Georgia on June 10, 2025,” the statement reads.
“Threatening our elected officials and their families is an act of violence that undermines our entire democracy,” said U.S. Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg. “Political discourse and disagreements never justify resorting to vile attacks against our nation’s leaders.”
“Targeting public officials with threatening messages is a serious federal crime,” said FBI Atlanta Special Agent in Charge Paul Brown. “There is no place for political violence or threats of violence in the United States. We will not hesitate to arrest and charge others who engage in similar criminal conduct.”
On June 15th, viraltrendingcontent reported the assassination of a Minnesota lawmaker and her husband, and the attempted assassination of a state senator and his wife at the hands of a man dressed as a police officer and driving a fake police car. It took hundreds of police officers to detain Vance Luther Boelter, 57
