ROOKE: Trump Assassination Plot Goes Unnoticed As Media Refuses To Look In Mirror
President Donald Trump was the victim of a third assassination attempt Sunday when an armed intruder entered his Mar-a-Lago residence. The rapid dismissal of this story by left-wing media reveals a desire to prevent any narrative that could humanize Trump or the Republicans.
When Trump survived the assassination attempt during the 2024 election season in Butler, Pennsylvania, many knew it was the end of the Democratic campaign for president. Democrats and their acolytes in the media were forced to humanize the man they had spent years demonizing as a threat to democracy, a fascist, or an enabler of extremism. And while their pause in attacks on Trump was brief, it showed ordinary Americans that their violent rhetoric served a clear purpose: fueling Democratic Party voter turnout. The left doesn’t care about democracy as much as it does about suppressing Republican momentum. (Subscribe to Mary Rooke’s weekly newsletter here!)
Austin Tucker Martin, a 21-year-old man from Cameron, North Carolina, armed with a shotgun and a gas canister, breached the security perimeter at Trump’s Palm Beach estate on Sunday. Confronted by vigilant U.S. Secret Service agents and Palm Beach County sheriff’s deputies, Martin raised his weapon, forcing law enforcement to neutralize the threat. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Fortunately, Trump was in Washington, DC, but this incident should have sent shockwaves across the country.
A man armed with a shotgun was shot and killed early Sunday morning after making “unauthorized entry” into the secure perimeter of President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property, the U.S. Secret Service said. https://t.co/VgHendKR82
– CBS News (@CBSNews) February 22, 2026
Yet by Monday morning, the story had all but disappeared from the headlines. The liberal media apparatus moved on with indecent haste. It’s as if no one cares anymore, a frightening sign of how desensitized our nation has become to violence, especially violence sparked by the left’s relentless anti-Trump hysteria.
Left-wing media, long used as the propaganda arm of the Democratic Party, only amplify threats when they fit their narrative of so-called right-wing extremism. If this were an attempt against a Democratic official like former President Joe Biden or former Vice President Kamala Harris, we would have been subjected to weeks of full-on media coverage, congressional hearings, and tearful editorials denouncing the right’s toxic rhetoric. But when the target is Trump or any other right-wing figure, the story ends.
Although the FBI and Secret Service have not released the official motive for the assassination attempt, some reports point out that Martin may have become radicalized against Trump due to his administration’s handling of the Epstein files. Martin’s apparent fixation on the Epstein files did not arise in a vacuum. This stems from years of baseless smears by Democrats, their media allies and anti-Trump Republicans, who peddled conspiracy theories accusing Trump of protecting pedophiles. The left has used Epstein’s name as a weapon to smear Trump, despite evidence showing that Trump cooperated with authorities during the 2008 prosecution of Epstein.
Democrats have gone completely Blue-Anon crazy
Jeffries says Trump admin ‘runs ap*dophile protection program’ pic.twitter.com/NjSOQ7GBEk
– Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) November 4, 2025
Yet headlines denounce Trump’s alleged ties to Epstein while glossing over former President Bill Clinton’s dozens of flights aboard Epstein’s private plane, the Lolita Express, as well as other Democratic donors’ ties to Epstein’s parties. Selective outrage radicalizes vulnerable individuals like Martin, who, as an alleged Trump supporter, may have felt betrayed by what he perceived as a failure to fully denounce the elite cabal.
Now, with Martin a potential pro-Trump figure perhaps driven mad by left-wing propaganda, the story is embarrassing and therefore should be kept out of mainstream American conversations. This shows how the media’s endless denigration of Trump creates a climate of hatred that backfires in violent and predictable ways.
Martin’s story is heartbreaking. A young man, by all early accounts patriotic and motivated by faith, descended into despair over Epstein because the media and Democrats presented the Epstein-Trump connection as a smoking gun, ignoring context. His radicalization is a direct consequence of the left’s hatred of Trump.
Previous attempts to assassinate Trump — like the Butler rally shooting or the September 2024 sniper plot at his West Palm Beach golf course by Ryan Wesley Routh, who was recently sentenced to life in prison — initially made headlines. But it didn’t take long for media coverage to turn to skepticism. The media and so-called journalists questioned whether the Butler event was staged. They downplayed the seriousness of the situations, avoiding any scrutiny of the incendiary Democratic rhetoric that might have provoked them.
It is not difficult to understand why this breakdown occurs. The left cannot afford to show that Trump is a victim of his outlandish rhetoric. It humanizes him like nothing else can. In turn, this would neutralize their attacks on Republicans, who are often targets of the same political violence that the left likes to pretend is exclusively or primarily a right-wing problem. Extensively covering another assassination attempt on Trump at Mar-a-Lago could force recognition of this imbalance, and they can’t afford that.
Translation: the director agrees to hatefully celebrate the murder.
Tragically, the left continues to resort to political violence. https://t.co/FblrAirRNN
-Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) October 22, 2025
Democrats rely on fear-mongering to activate their base. If they fail to accuse Trump of a threat to democracy or Republicans of enablers of extremism, they will have to be honest about the policies their party supports, which Americans are widely opposed to.
Desensitization to violence allows it to escalate, while biased media coverage serves to further polarize the nation. Charlie Kirk was murdered in front of millions of Americans, and the media apparatus was complicit in excusing violence by demonizing his speech. (RELATED: Is the first domino in the fight against child abuse falling?)
Because they have not been held accountable, Democrats will not reject their rhetoric as the midterm elections approach. They will use the 2026 media cycle to continue promoting anti-Republican smear, building field operations for Democratic voter turnout.
Unfortunately, Americans are likely to see a lot more violence before the end of this year.
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