A CNN political analyst put out an image of President Trump in crosshairs — exactly what Sarah Palin did and which caused liberal commentators to blame her for the Gabby Giffords assassination attempt.
Chris Cillizza tweeted out the image of President Trump speaking at a memorial for slain police officers Tuesday.
“Donald Trump, pointing to heavens to commemorate police officers killed in the line of duty,” Mr. Cillizza wrote on the initial tweet.
Mr. Cillizza later deleted the tweet when people began taking him to task and reporting him to Twitter as having encouraged an assassination attempt.
He said the graphic was a GIF program that defaults to that image as its first frame.
“To clear up any unintended confusion, I’ve removed the tweet,” he wrote.
Conservatives with long memories weren’t impressed, calling to mind a map Mrs. Palin had put out in 2010 in which crosshairs were placed over 20 Congressional districts she and John McCain had won in 2008 but had Democratic incumbents in the upcoming 2010 elections.
One of the districts was that of Mrs. Giffords. Led by Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas, Mrs. Palin was blamed for the attack on her that killed six other people, even before the name of gunman Jared Lee Loughner had been released, much less any ties proven between him and Mrs. Palin or tea-party politics (there were none).
“Reminds me of Sarah Palin’s cross hair ads,” wrote conservative Tweeter Mike Cernovich.
While Mr. Cillizza never blamed Mrs. Palin for the Giffords assassination bid, he did say that when she denied involvement and decried the “reporting” against her, she had had “the worst week in Washington” for portraying herself as a victim and using the term “blood libel.”
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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