CNN Analyst Cites ‘Assassination Culture’ (Not Trump) After WHCD Attack

That line of attack was on display almost immediately in an interview with Steve Schmidt, a founder of the disgraced Lincoln Project. Asked whether the country has a “rhetoric problem” in light of multiple assassination attempts on President Trump, Schmidt pointed squarely at Trump: “I think that there's one person, beyond and above all others, who's responsible for poisoning the rhetoric in America. And that guy's name is Donald Trump . . . He's an insurrectionist, the foremost domestic enemy of the Constitution in American history. He is a vile and disgusting man. A convicted sex predator, and likely a pedophile.” Steve, we've got your vile and disgusting man right here. But on Sunday morning, a very different explanation emerged on CNN. Appearing on special coverage, CNN security analyst and former Secret Service agent Jonathan Wackrow did not point to Trump. Instead, he described what he called an “assassination culture”—a decentralized, digitally driven phenomenon in which grievance and ideology are reinforced in online echo chambers. CNN Analyst Rejects Trump Blame, Cites ‘Assassination Culture’ pic.twitter.com/noj78tV82I — Mark Finkelstein (@markfinkelstein) April 26, 2026 Wackrow warned that such attackers are often shaped by online communities where violence becomes normalized and even encouraged. He cited what he termed the “Mangione effect,” in which individuals latch onto a grievance, find validation online, and come to see violent action as justified. In other words, rather than attributing the attack to Trump's rhetoric, Wackrow pointed to a broader ecosystem—one that operates largely independent of any one politician and is far more difficult to detect or deter. The contrast was stark: while some voices rushed to assign personal blame, CNN’s own security analyst pointed to a broader—and less politically convenient—explanation. Here's the transcript. CNN 4/26/26 6:11 am EDT VICTOR BLACKWELL: The president says that he wants to have this event again within 30 days, and I imagine there's some logistical acrobatics that have to happen to do that just to get all those people back in the room. But from a security perspective, what will that have to look like to be able to do it, considering what happened last night? CNN SECURITY EXPERT JONATHAN WACKROW: Well, right now, what the Secret Service and their law enforcement partners are doing is, with this subject, they're actually looking back. Is this individual, while he was a lone attacker last night, was he influenced by any other type of group? Now, to me, what this incident really illustrates is the consequence of what I've referred to in the past as assassination culture. It's this dangerous mix of grievance, ideology, and a sense of moral absolutism by an individual to take action. And what's really dangerous and what the Secret Service and the FBI and other law enforcement entities know, is that this type of structure is really digitally native. So you may have this lone attacker, but they're influenced online, typically in social media chat rooms. And what's happening is violence is being normalized really in this small echo chamber, and really killing of notable people is encouraged. And really, we refer to this as the Mangione effect, right? It's where people are taking a sliver of grievance, they're finding a group of people that also align to that, they're socializing it online, and then normalizing this violence. That is the scariest part of this, and the Secret Service knows that. So prior to any other type of event for the president, they are going to go back and reassess the threat environment that's around all Secret Service protectees, to ensure that they're picking up any of digital signals of conversations in the wake of last night to see what this new threat environment looks like if this was targeted against the president. BLACKWELL: Jonathan Wackrow, I appreciate your informative conversation. Thank you so much. Mark Finkelstein Sun, 04/26/2026 - 12:57 Marketing Timing Timely Search Engine Title CNN Analyst Cites ‘Assassination Culture’—Not Trump—After WHCD Attack CNS Commentary Off