Donald Trump Is A Leader Who Cares Only For Chaos

President Trump defends a killer as everyday Americans endure the ongoing grind of life under a leader who cares only for chaos

- Brian Karem

We certainly live in interesting times.

Last Tuesday a 17-year-old white boy armed with an AR-15 crossed state lines to Kenosha, Wisconsin. He joined the protest there as a self-styled vigilante; local police thanked him for his efforts and gave him water. Later, according to police reports and witnesses, the boy shot three people, killing two.

There was no apparent provocation for the shooting. In fact, at first there was no retribution. The boy, Kyle Rittenhouse, apparently tried to give himself up to police; they told him to go home. That’s where he was later arrested without incident. He now awaits trial on charges of homicide and attempted homicide, innocent until proven guilty.

On Monday in the Brady Briefing Room, President Donald Trump defended the actions of Rittenhouse, an apparent Trump supporter who had attended a January rally and praised the president on social media.

“They very violently attacked him,” Trump said. “He probably would’ve been killed.”

Rittenhouse was an out-of-state teen disobeying curfew and illegally open-carrying a firearm in defense of property he did not own. He apparently put the preservation of property above the preservation of life and the rule of law.

The floodgates appear to be open for vigilante killings—as long as the killer is white and praises Trump. The need to question the president’s lack of human decency as well as his mental health has never been more obvious. This is a president who says his pandemic response—horribly bungled, with more than 180,000 deaths—is actually a triumph for his administration.