The office of Arizona Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes is “looking into” whether Donald Trump broke state law when he said Liz Cheney should face rifles “shooting at her” to see how she feels about sending troops to fight.
“The Arizona Attorney-General’s Office is looking into whether Donald Trump’s comments about Liz Cheney violated Arizona law,” Richie Taylor, communications director for the office, said in a statement on Friday. “The office has no additional comments to make at this time.”
Trump made the comments about Cheney, one of the former president’s biggest Republican critics and the daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney, to former Fox News Host Tucker Carlson at a campaign event in Glendale on Thursday.
“She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her. OK, let’s see how she feels about it.
“You know when the guns are trained on her face – you know, they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building, saying, ‘Oh, gee, well, let’s send, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy.’”
In an interview on Friday with 12News, a local television station in Arizona, Mayes said Trump’s comments were “deeply troubling.”
“I have already asked my criminal division chief to start looking at that statement, analysing it for whether it qualifies as a death threat under Arizona’s laws,” Mayes told 12News.
“I’m not prepared now to say whether it was or it wasn’t, but it is not helpful as we prepare for our election and as we try to make sure that we keep the peace at our polling places and in our state,” she continued.
Associated Press