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How violence became a theme of America’s election | Financial Times
Source: Financial Times | 4 November 2024
Voters are on edge after a campaign season characterised by ‘unprecedented’ levels of extreme rhetoric
A Donald Trump supporter brandishing a machete at a polling station in Florida. Ballot boxes set on fire in three separate states. Envelopes full of white powder sent to election boards. Shots fired at a Democratic party office in Arizona. And two attempts on the life of the Republican candidate.
The 2024 presidential campaign has been marred by “unprecedented” violence, or threats of violence, against public figures and election workers, according to US officials. Law enforcement agencies are braced for civil unrest, regardless of who wins.
Instead of seeking to calm tensions, campaigners have traded ever more aggressive barbs. In recent decades “there has been nothing like this rhetoric in national elections,” said Alex Keyssar, a Harvard historian of US democracy. While “avid partisans” deployed menacing speech in previous clashes, this time “the violent rhetoric is coming from the top”, he added.
