Feds Charge Anti-Trumper with Plotting Armed Response Against Pro-Trump Rally in FL
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. attorney's office says an anti-Trump Florida man has been charged with trying to organize an armed response to pro-Trump protesters expected at the state Capitol on Sunday.
An affidavit from an FBI agent says Daniel Baker, of Tallahassee, was using social media to recruit people in a plot to encircle protesters and trap them in the Capitol.
The court document describes threats of violence and a prediction of civil war. Baker is described as anti-Trump, anti-government, anti-white supremacist and anti-police.
He is charged with transmission in interstate commerce of a communication containing a threat to kidnap or to injure. He was in custody Friday, and it wasn’t immediately clear if he has an attorney.
U.S. Attorney Lawrence Keefe said: “Extremists intent on violence from either end of the political and social spectrums must be stopped, and they will be stopped.”
Baker was kicked out of the Army in 2007 after going AWOL before being deployed to Iraq. The affidavit said Baker was then homeless and largely unemployed for the following nine years.
“REMEMBER THAT THE COPS WONT PROTECT US BECAUSE THE COPS AND KLAN GO HAND IN HAND!” Baker wrote on a Facebook event page he created, according to the affidavit. “If you are afraid to die fighting the enemy, then stay in bed and live. Call all of your friends and Rise Up!”
