Maggie Haberman Reveals ‘Primary Driver’ Of Trump Psyche In Wake Of Charlie Kirk Killing

New York Instances reporter Maggie Haberman on Wednesday broke down why Charlie Kirk’s assassination is now taking on essentially the most area in President Donald Trump’s White Home. (Try her feedback beneath.)

In an look on CNN’s “The Area with Kasie Hunt,” Haberman advised the host that “threats” on Trump’s life — and people round him — are on the prime of his thoughts, pointing to the 2 failed assassination makes an attempt in opposition to him final yr.

“It’s actually arduous to overstate how shaken the White Home and the president was and had been by Charlie Kirk’s assassination,” she mentioned of Trump, whose administration requested a $58 million security boost following the killing.

“Lots of people within the White Home had been very near Charlie Kirk — or knew him or admired him — and President Trump was additionally near him but additionally sees this by way of the threats on his life. And so, I feel that’s what you’re seeing is a main driver [for the White House] proper now.”

Haberman mentioned the administration’s Jeffrey Epstein saga would have taken up most of its headspace a few weeks in the past however Trump has since made it “very clear” that he’s partaking in “crackdowns” in opposition to the left.

The president has pinned the blame for Kirk’s assassination on the “radical left” and cherry-picked episodes of political violence to make the case that the left is extra violent than the suitable.

In his video message from the Oval Workplace on the killing, he referred to the assassination try in opposition to him in Butler, Pennsylvania, final yr in addition to assaults in opposition to federal immigration brokers, the UnitedHealthcare CEO taking pictures and the 2017 taking pictures that injured then-Home Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R).