Authorities in Arizona say a man arrested in connection with a string of shootings targeting Democratic campaign offices in the Phoenix area kept more than 120 guns at his home and apparently had been plotting a mass casualty event.
On Thursday, a source confirmed to NBC News that Democrats are no longer using the office, which was targeted in three separate shootings. The suspect, a 60-year-old man named Jeffrey Michael Kelly, was arrested Tuesday on several charges, including committing an act of terrorism, unlawful discharge of a firearm and shooting at a nonresidential structure.
And more charges may be on the way. As NBC News reported:
Police said Wednesday that additional charges may be filed in connection with plastic bags containing a white powdery substance hung on political signs that Kelly is accused of posting and lining with razor blades in the village of Ahwatukee, where he lives. When he was arrested, Kelly had a machine gun and “numerous guns in his car to potentially do something,” Deputy Maricopa County Attorney Neha Bhatia said. “The state and law enforcement believes that this person was preparing to commit an act of mass casualty with the guns he had,” Bhatia said at Kelly’s initial appearance in Superior Court, saying investigators also found multiple machine guns, loaded firearms, silencers, long-range scopes and body armor in his home.
A defense attorney, Jason Squires, warned against prejudging Kelly, whom he described as a retired aerospace engineer and a “sportsman” who had licenses for legally owning a variety of firearms, NBC News reported.
MAGA conspiracy theorists have helped turn Arizona, which has seen historic shifts toward Democratic politicians in recent years, into a hotbed of extremism — and a target for violent extremists outside the state. For the first time, the state’s governor, two U.S. senators, secretary of state and attorney general are all Democrats. And Democrats are now vying to win full control of the state Legislature for the first time in nearly 60 years.
A lot of far-right fury has been conjured up in the meantime. This week, an Alabama man received prison time after making death threats against Arizona election workers. And recent reports have highlighted the spate of violent threats that election workers in the state have been facing more broadly.
And now, in Arizona, we seem to have yet another example of an extremist who’s willing to deploy violent threats in an effort to intimidate those seen as opponents to the MAGA cause.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.