President Trump warned "bad things" happen when Democrats provoke the right, tying the Wednesday shooting at a Dallas ICE facility to "radical left" rhetoric.
Why it matters: The president's comments risk inflaming already high tensions after the deadly shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk as officials point fingers at ideological opponents for political violence.
What they're saying: "Bad things happen when they play these games," Trump said at an Oval Office news conference Thursday.
- "I'll give you a little clue, the right is a lot tougher than the left," he said. "… They better not get them energized because it won't be good for the left, and I don't want to see that happen either."
- White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told Axios the president was pointing out "the right is not committing the heinous acts of targeted violence that the left is."
Driving the news: The president issued the warning in response to a question about the shooting at a Dallas Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility Wednesday.
- The sniper killed one detainee and wounded two others, who remained in critical condition as of Thursday morning.
- Acting ICE director Todd Lyons identified the gunman as 29-year-old Joshua Jahn, who officials said died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
- The FBI is investigating the attack as "targeted violence" after the agency said it found one shell casing at the scene etched with "ANTI ICE".
Zoom out: America has witnessed more high-profile assassination attempts in the past 14 months than at any point since the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were shot in 1968.
- Politicians and pundits quickly blamed the violence on their opponents' rhetoric, often before key facts were made public.
- The phrase "civil war" has surged on social media and in Google searches, NBC News reported, as Republican politicians adopt harsher language against the left.
Go deeper: ICE shooting sparks partisan blame game before facts confirmed
