Russian President Vladimir Putin enjoys absolute immunity when it comes to doing away with his political opponents. But Russia is exploiting Saturday’s assassination attempt against Donald Trump by claiming that President Joe Biden and Democrats want to eliminate the former president.
Russian media monitor Julia Davis observed in The Daily Beast that Russian media propagandists were “giddy with excitement Sunday saying that had predicted that Biden would try to have Trump killed and claiming their MAGA hero was now certain to win” the presidential election.
Davis wrote:
For years, Russian state media pundits have been claiming that the Democrats would assassinate Donald Trump and even previously proposed that Russia’s Federal Security Service should “start protecting our Donald.”
Unconstrained by facts or journalistic standards—striving to kill two birds with one stone—Russian propagandists are now blaming both the Democrats and Ukrainians for an attempt on Trump’s life.
Russian officials were a bit more restrained in their comments than Putin’s TV propagandists, but still went after Biden.
Reuters quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying, “We do not believe that the attempt to eliminate and assassinate Trump was organized by the current authorities. But the atmosphere around candidate Trump ... provoked what America is confronting today."
Peskov then added that it was obvious that Trump’s life was in jeopardy.
"After numerous attempts to remove candidate Trump from the political arena using legal instruments at first, courts, the prosecutor’s office, attempts to politically discredit and compromise the candidate it was obvious to all outside observers that his life was in jeopardy," Peskov said.
According to Russia’s official TASS news agency, Peskov added: “Russia has always condemned and we strongly condemn any expressions of violence during political struggle."
Tell that to opposition leader Alexei Navalny and other Putin opponents who are now dead.
Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, predicted that Trump was now certain to win the presidential election in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.
And Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of Russia’s lower house of parliament, said America’s deep divisions and Washington’s focus on “interfering” in other nations’ affairs were all causes of the assassination attempt on Trump, Reuters reported.
"With its years-long policy, the United States has let itself reach literally the brink of civil war," Volodin wrote on Telegram.
But Putin’s propagandists showed absolutely no restraint in blaming Democrats for the attack against Trump.
In her Daily Beast story, Davis reported on Sundays broadcast of the show “At Dawn” on the Solovyov Live network.
John Varoli, a former New York Times correspondent in Moscow, made this baseless claim: “The Democratic Party is doing everything to destroy Donald Trump!”
And Varoli then added: “In all seriousness, I believe that the Ukrainian special services may be behind this—on orders from the White House.”
Davis wrote that the show’s host, Andrey Ponomar, played an old clip from “Saturday Night Live” where Jim Carrey jokingly portrays President Joe Biden firing a gun and suggested that the president would resort to “shooting his opponents.”
Davis wrote:
Ponomar claimed that Biden and the “deep state” are ready to drown America and the rest of the world in blood. Varoli concurred and said: “Joe Biden is a terrorist. He orders many terrorist acts against your country [Russia]. Under Joe Biden, the United States became the biggest sponsor of terrorism in the world.”
Varoli added that the Secret Service and other U.S. intelligence agencies are controlled by the government, ludicrously suggesting that they are “full of liberals” and might have participated in an attack on Trump.
Davis added that another Russian TV host, Ivan Kamenev, openly expressed hope for an American Civil War — an outcome much hoped for by Russian propagandists
Kamenev said: “I have an internal feeling that everything that is happening now depends on Trump. I will say something that is not politically correct. Trump has Biden’s balls in his hand, because everyone is waiting for his statement right now ... It’s possible that he will gather the facts, come out and say, ‘This attempt was planned by Democrats, I have verifiable information about this. I believe that the current President and his team are behind it ... And then there will be civil war!’”
These conspiracy theories were put out before the Trump rally shooter was identified by the FBI as Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old from Bethel Park, Pa.
But there are indications where Russia’s disinformation campaign might go next. Davis reported that one of Putin’s chief TV propagandists Vladimir Solovyov, said Sunday night on his state TV program “Moscow. Kremlin. Putin.”: “We should be seriously concerned about Donald Trump’s life.”
Davis wrote that Solovyov accused the Secret Service of either being “unprofessional and stupid,” or being in on it and deliberately allowing the attacker to take his shot.
The TV host predicted Trump’s imminent victory in the upcoming presidential election, declaring that he is now unstoppable—barring a more efficient assassin.
Showcasing the photograph of the bloodied former president pumping his fist in the air, Solovyov praised him, describing his reaction as that of a seasoned “political animal.” ... Solovyov added: “This is the moment after which Trump will obviously become president ... This is it! This is a tragedy for Zelensky.”
And then there’s this, Russian troops have written these slogans on bombs to be fired at Ukrainian targets: “For Trump” and “For Trump’s Ear.”
