Three University of South Alabama students are sitting in federal custody tonight after posting explicit death threats against President Trump ahead of his Mobile rally—and the press corps that lectures Americans about "threats to democracy" every time a Democrat gets heckled can barely summon a headline.
Amare Jemal Woods, Cameron Lamark Lewis, and Kayla Leaann Smith each face federal charges of threatening the president. According to court records, the threats were made separately on social media and were not coordinated—but each one was unambiguous. FBI agents discovered the posts during an intelligence sweep of social media on Sept. 29 in anticipation of Trump's campus visit. All three were taken into custody Friday and will appear in court Monday for detention hearings.
Woods, a freshman aerospace engineering student, posted on TikTok on Sept. 27: "he gotta die bro," with a crying emoji, in response to a post about Trump's intended visit. Lewis, a biology student and Walgreens pharmacy technician, posted on X on Sept. 26 referencing the assassination of Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University, then followed up with a second statement referencing the ambush shooting death of rapper Mikquale Cooper, known as "Bloodhound Q50." Smith, an elementary education student, replied to a TikTok about Trump coming to homecoming with: "We only got one chance let's take it," and posted an image of an individual mimicking holding a firearm.
These are not ambiguous statements. They are explicit invocations of assassination and ambush violence against a sitting president.
Woods' attorney, Jason Darley, described his client as a "diminutive kid" who may have gotten caught up in the vitriol of social media. "This kid is the furthest away from any defendant I've ever represented in federal court in 21 years," Darley said. Perhaps. But federal prosecutors don't bring threatening-the-president charges for edgy jokes.
AL.com covered the arrests straight—as a local crime story, which is more than most national outlets managed. The Intercept, for its part, spent its Alabama ink this week on Birmingham public radio being compelled to say "Gulf of America"—a compelled speech story, to be sure, but one involving a naming controversy, not assassination threats against the commander in chief. The editorial priority speaks volumes.
Imagine for a moment these threats had been directed at Biden. Three college students referencing assassination and ambush shootings against a sitting Democratic president ahead of a rally—there would be wall-to-wall coverage, congressional hearings by sundown, and a thousand think pieces about the rot at the heart of MAGA America. The FBI's intelligence sweep would be proof of a sprawling conspiracy, not a local crime blotter item.
The institutional press's "threats to democracy" rhetoric is a partisan tool, not a principle. When the threats are real and the target is Trump, the volume drops to a whisper.
