‘Lock and Load’: Trump-Loving Extremists React to FBI Search of Mar-a-Lago

The far-right in the United States responded ominously to the FBI’s Monday night search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida mansion, with Republican lawmakers and television personalities baselessly accusing the Biden administration of weaponizing the Justice Department and popular as well as anonymous social media users beating the drums of a civil war.

“Lock and load,” says the top comment related to the Mar-a-Lago search on patriots.win—a pro-Trump comment forum that emerged after Reddit banned the r/The_Donald group of nearly 800,000 for repeatedly posting racist and misogynistic content in violation of its rules against harassment and targeting.

When one user asks, “Are we not in a cold civil war at this point?” another suggests that violence is imminent, with “authentic pain” coming soon.

According to NBC News reporter Ben Collins, the content shared on pro-Trump forums Monday night was arguably even more violent when compared to the content of the deadly January 6, 2021 attack.

As he did before last year’s insurrection at the Capitol, Trump only has “to ask us,” notes one commenter. Another writes: “None of this demonstrating in the snow shit. Summertime was made for killing fields.”

It wasn’t just anonymous posters threatening to mow down their perceived political enemies. For instance, highly influential reactionary Steven Crowder tweeted, “Tomorrow is war,” followed less than 12 hours later by, “Today is war.” The NRA also leapt at the opportunity to boost gun sales.

Fox News hosts and guests, meanwhile, quickly disparaged the Mar-a-Lago search as a “partisan witch hunt,” “dark day for our republic,” “preemptive coup,” “Third World bullshit,” and the work of the “Gestapo” and “Stasi,” as documented by Media Matters for America.

The right-wing outrage machine was adopting talking points that Trump laid out in a statement portraying himself as the victim of “prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the justice system, and an attack by radical left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for president.”

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) endorsed Trump’s unsubstantiated claim that the Biden White House is “using government power to persecute political opponents,” calling it “something we have seen many times” from authoritarian regimes in impoverished nations “but never before in America.” The House Judiciary Committee’s Republicans, led by Rep. Jim Jordan (Ohio), echoed that message.

During an appearance on Fox News, Jordan demanded that Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray—a Trump appointee—answer the GOP’s questions about Monday night’s search at Mar-a-Lago.

As Media Matters senior fellow Matthew Gertz explained, the Justice Department is not yet able to provide details given the ongoing nature of investigations into Trump’s attempt to overthrow the U.S. government and other possible crimes, so the ex-president and his allies are “filling that vacuum” with baseless accusations of political malfeasance.