{"id":27130,"date":"2025-04-14T14:53:02","date_gmt":"2025-04-14T18:53:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=27130"},"modified":"2025-04-14T14:53:02","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T18:53:02","slug":"a-shocking-percent-of-liberals-think-killing-trump-musk-would-be-justified","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/04\/a-shocking-percent-of-liberals-think-killing-trump-musk-would-be-justified","title":{"rendered":"A Shocking Percent of Liberals Think Killing Trump, Musk Would be Justified"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Left: Jonah Elkowitz \/ Shutterstock | Right: Alessia Pierdomenico \/ Shutterstock.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A new poll is showing just how divided, and violent, the political divide has become. The Network Contagion Research Institute and Rutgers University\u2019s Social Perception Lab conducted a study<\/a> entitled \u201cAssassination Culture: How Burning Teslas and Killing Billionaires Became a Meme Aesthetic for Political Violence,\u201d interviewing 1,264 US adults about their perceptions of political violence. The study\u2019s title comes from the increased property damage against Teslas and Tesla dealerships. Recently, a dealership in Rome caught fire, destroying 17 cars. Elon Musk insisted that \u201cterrorism\u201d was behind the fire<\/a>.<\/p>\n

According to the survey, 39.8 percent of respondents thought the destruction of Tesla dealerships as a form of protest was at least somewhat acceptable or more. That number increased amongst self-identified left of center respondents, with 57.6 percent calling the destruction justified. Respondents were also asked about the justifiability of assassinating either Musk or President Trump. Overall, 31.6 percent thought murdering Musk would be somewhat justified, while 38.5 percent said the same for the president. Those numbers also increased amongst liberal respondents, with 48.6 percent approving Musk\u2019s murder and 55.2 percent at least somewhat approving Trump\u2019s.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis report points to disturbingly high levels of support for political violence, particularly targeting President Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Across survey responses, nearly one-third of respondents \u2014 and a significantly higher share of left-leaning respondents \u2014 expressed some degree of justification for acts of lethal violence,\u201d the report stated. The data corresponds with a 2024 study that analyzed how social media promoted political violence. The study also found a higher correlation with those who supported the alleged murder of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson by Luigi Mangione.<\/p>\n

The report noted the results highlighted the trend of a growing \u201cassassination culture,\u201d spurred on by social media. \u201cUnless political and cultural leadership explicitly confronts and condemns this trend, [a] growing probability of real-world escalation exists. Given the current economic volatility and institutional distrust, the online normalization of political violence may increasingly translate into offline action,\u201d the report warned. \u201cTaken together, the findings underscore the erosion of democratic norms and the growing acceptability of political violence in American discourse, particularly among ideologically extreme communities online. Continued monitoring and broader measurement efforts are urgently needed.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new poll is showing just how divided, and violent, the political divide has become. The Network Contagion Research Institute and Rutgers University\u2019s Social Perception Lab conducted a study entitled \u201cAssassination Culture: How Burning Teslas and Killing Billionaires Became a Meme Aesthetic for Political Violence,\u201d interviewing 1,264 US adults about their perceptions of political violence.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":516,"featured_media":27133,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nA Shocking Percent of Liberals Think Killing Trump, Musk Would be Justified<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A new poll reveals alarming support for political violence against figures like Trump and Musk.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/04\/a-shocking-percent-of-liberals-think-killing-trump-musk-would-be-justified\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Shocking Percent of Liberals Think Killing Trump, Musk Would be Justified\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A new poll reveals alarming support for political violence against figures like Trump and Musk.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/04\/a-shocking-percent-of-liberals-think-killing-trump-musk-would-be-justified\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-04-14T18:53:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" 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