I’m sorry, but I have to disagree here. We cannot allow ourselves to be dragged down to the level of accusing anyone who says something inflammatory with making terroristic threats. What he said was remarkably stupid, but not threatening.

Huckabee said two things. He parrotted the right-wing talking points alleging a huge Biden conspiracy, and he said that if Trump doesn’t win, there will be violence.

Parrotting Trump’s talking points isn’t illegal. Profoundly stupid, but not illegal. If that were allowed, 95% of the GOP would be locked up behind bars.

And take a look at January 6th. Take a look at all the political violence over the past couple of years. Atlanta went into pseudo-lockdown a couple of weeks ago when Trump was arrested because the threat of violence was (and continues to be) very real. MAGA nuts have been attacking everything from FBI offices to libraries. The “bullets instead of ballots” bit wasn’t a terroristic threat – it’s the reality of the situation: If Trump loses, for any reason, or is kept off the ballot through the 14th amendment, there is the very real likelihood that rioting will follow. Acknowledging reality isn’t necessarily acknowledging support for that reality, or advocating it. It’s simply acknowledging the reality of the situation.

There was no implied threat by Huckabee. He doesn’t have the following Trump has. People are not going to be willing to follow him right into a jail cell. He wasn’t saying that he’d be leading the charge or anything. He just said that if Trump loses, there will be violence in the streets. And strictly on that point alone, I agree with him. I do believe that Trump either being disqualified from the election or losing it will cause violence. Saying that doesn’t make either of us terrorists, even if the rest of what he said was abhorrent.