Amid national tension, a man placing Trump signs is attacked in Michigan

An act of political violence in a small Michigan town left an 80-year-old man in critical condition over the weekend, local officials said. His assailant, who called the police to confess, later killed himself.

The attack unfolded Sunday evening in Hancock, a city in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, when a man ripped out yard signs supporting former President Donald Trump. He then used an all-terrain vehicle to run over the 80-year-old who was trying to put the signs back up, local authorities said.

Chief Tami Sleeman of the Hancock police said the incident was one of three involving the 22-year-old suspect last weekend. He also used a shovel to destroy the windows of a parked truck with a sticker supporting Trump, the chief said, and vandalized the tires of a parked vehicle that had a sticker supporting law enforcement.

The suspect later left a message with the Police Department saying he wanted to confess to an attack, Sleeman said, but killed himself before officers arrived at his home just outside the city limits Monday.

The violence, occurring just over a week after an assassination attempt on Trump, was an alarming and unwelcome intrusion of political toxicity in a place where local officials say people generally get along, despite partisan differences.

“We’re just hoping and praying for a better, more civil discourse, not only in Houghton County, but at the national level; that we can get through this election cycle without any violence,” said the county sheriff, Joshua B. Saaranen, a Republican.

Sleeman said there was no indication that anyone else was involved in the attacks, but she said the investigation was continuing. Officers took electronics from the home of the suspect, whose name was not released, while executing a search warrant, and the FBI was contacted.

Political tension is hardly new in Michigan, a swing state that both Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris hope to carry in November. In the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election, federal officials arrested several men who they said were plotting to kidnap and possibly kill Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat. Some of those men were ultimately convicted, while others were acquitted.

But Hancock, which has a population of about 4,500, is seldom the center of political attention. Trump carried Houghton County, which includes Hancock, by about 14 percentage points in 2020, while President Joe Biden won the state. Neither the police chief nor the sheriff could recall a similar act of political violence in the area, which is roughly 550 miles by car from Detroit.

A spokesperson for the Harris campaign said on Tuesday that “politically motivated violence is always unacceptable and we unequivocally condemn it.” Whitmer’s office released a statement saying that “we need to come together to turn down the heat and chart a better path forward for our politics.” A spokesperson for the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Sleeman said the attack happened after the man on the ATV yelled obscenities and tore out Trump signs displayed outside a home in a residential area. The 80-year-old victim, whose family member lived in the home, went to put the signs back in the ground, the chief said. The younger man then drove his ATV onto the lawn, seemed to accelerate and struck the victim from behind.

The ATV driver fled the scene, the chief said, and the victim was taken to the hospital with critical injuries. He was communicating with law enforcement officials Tuesday, the chief said.

“Any person knows that doing what this person did could have killed this man,” Sleeman said, adding, “It’s been upsetting because we just haven’t experienced this type of hate toward each other.”

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