Would-be political assassins deserve harsh sentences | Opinion
Left-wing political violence and the rhetoric that fuel it have been having a moment over the last few weeks. Whether it is a shooting targeting Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Texas, a Virginia Attorney General candidate musing about shooting a political opponent in the head or an anti-ICE crowd in Illinois chanting “Shoot ICE,” we’re seeing it more than at any time I can remember.
Research backs that up. Just as the chants were ringing out before the cameras in Illinois, the centrist Center for Strategic and International Studies released a report finding that Trump’s populist right rise to power has been matched by an unprecedented rise in left-wing violence to its “highest level in 30 years.”
The study was an academic coda to what was already obvious in the wake of the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and two attempts on the life of President Donald Trump. The White House and conservatives of all stripes have cited the report as evidence for the perfidy of the political opponents, but what few have grappled with is that the majority of political violence over the last decade of rising left-wing violence has been right-wing violence that was already at high levels.
Right-wing violence high, too
In every year from 2020 through 2024, right-wing violence and violent plots outnumbered their left-wing counterparts by far, only in 2025 did that change (and the year is not over). With liberals and progressives rightly pointing out that the bulk of the recent problem is on the right and with conservatives and populists rightly pointing out that the left is where violence is quickly rising, there’s not much agreement that this is a problem both sides need to address.
Indeed, one only needs to dig a little in social media or among the hottest-headed partisans to hear excuses for the worst excesses of the George Floyd riots on the left and the Jan. 6 insurrection on the right. That excuse-making on the right goes all the way to the top with Trump pardoning violent Jan. 6 insurrectionists while Democratic leaders and liberal commentators focused more on minimizing the violence at their “mostly-peaceful” protests while condemning looting and murder.
But it seems to me that there should be one area where there can be bipartisan agreement that we need to draw a clear line. Political assassinations and the plots to commit them should be punished harshly. Not only do these acts threaten the lives of our leaders, they undermine precious rights like those to speech and assembly and hurt us all by making it more difficult for our democracy to continue to be the way we peaceably settle our differences.
Last week, a Joe Biden-appointed Virginia judge failed our democracy by giving out a ridiculously lenient sentence to the person who traveled cross country in a plot to kill anti-Roe Supreme Court justices, before being arrested outside Trump appointee Brett Kavanaugh’s suburban home with burglary tools, zip ties and a firearm.
Judge Deborah Boardman gave Sophie Roske a sentence of 97 months in federal prison, just 30 days more than the defense had asked for and far less than the 30 years the Justice Department requested. Boardman cited Roske’s transgender status and the Trump administration’s transgender policies in giving the lenient sentence.
Missouri sentence just
That is a far cry from what happened just a few weeks earlier in Missouri where two white male cisgender right-wing militia members were sentenced on more numerous, but similar charges of attempted murder of Border Patrol and FBI agents. Their sentences from a judge appointed by President Barack Obama? One hundred sixty-five years in one case. Fifteen consecutive life terms in the other. The judge made no excuses for the men.
There are important differences between the cases, not the least of which is that the Missouri men actually opened fire, but that is why prosecutors only asked for 30 years for Roske, who surrendered before pulling a gun and had no previous criminal record.
With the country on edge after the shooting of Kirk and too much political violence from both the left and the right, the least that responsible people from both parties should be able to agree on is harsh sentences for people who try to settle political disagreements with bullets. That’s what the judge delivered in Missouri. In Virginia, not so much.
This story was originally published October 8, 2025 at 6:08 AM with the headline "Would-be political assassins deserve harsh sentences | Opinion."
