Three Students Arrested for Threatening Trump Ahead of Campus Rally
Three college students arrested for threatening President Trump online before his campus rally.
2 min read
Three University of South Alabama students were arrested by federal authorities after making threatening social media posts just hours before President Donald Trump’s rally on campus. Amare Jemal Woods, Cameron Lamark Lewis, and Kayla Leaann Smith each face federal charges of threatening the president following their arrests on Friday, according to 1819 News.
Investigators treated the cases as unconnected rather than a coordinated plan, according to the news outlet. Woods, a freshman studying aerospace engineering, allegedly posted the comment “he gotta die bro” beneath a TikTok video about the president’s campus stop, as reported by the FBI affidavit. Smith, an elementary education major, allegedly wrote, “We only got one chance let’s take it,” and posted an image of a person imitating someone holding a gun. Lewis allegedly wrote on X that “niggas gon remember the University of South Alabama the same way they remember Utah Valley University,” according to the affidavit. A second post from Lewis called for a killing, according to investigators.
JUST IN: 3 students arrested for threats toward President Trump, University of South Alabama confirms https://t.co/hnPySk9Qer
Federal agents found the messages while scanning social media before Trump’s Oct. 2 appearance, relying on emergency disclosure requests and campus police to tie the accounts to the students, according to Fox News. Woods’s attorney, Jason Darley, rejected any suggestion that his client posed a real danger. “If this kid is a threat, then everybody pecking on a keyboard is a threat,” Darley told FOX10. A conviction carries up to five years in prison.
The three remained jailed ahead of detention hearings scheduled for Monday afternoon, according to Fox News. Their arrests came alongside other violent remarks that 1819 News located online before the rally, including a protest group chat where a participant identified as Roman Fulford wrote, “HELP ME RISE UP TO BLOW UP TRUMP.” None of those posts have been named by authorities as the basis for the charges, according to 1819 News.
The Republican National Committee rented the Mitchell Center for the event, which the school did not sponsor, according to Fox News. Trump spoke Friday evening as planned, telling the crowd, “It sort of all began here.” The university condemned the alleged threats. “The University of South Alabama unequivocally condemns any form of threats directed at elected officials or any individual with whom we disagree,” the school said in a statement, according to 1819 News.
Source: Daily Caller
