Fired ISU teaching assistant who flipped TPUSA table arrested again for alleged threats against Trump
An Illinois State University teaching assistant who was recently fired and arrested for flipping a TPUSA table was taken into custody again.
The man was taken into custody during a traffic stop for threats he made against President Trump.
A former university employee who was recently fired and arrested for his vandalism against a conservative student group is back in custody.
Derek Lopez, a graduate student and former teaching assistant at Illinois State University, was fired after flipping a Turning Point USA table and saying “Jesus did it,” according to a Campus Reform report.
Now Lopez is in hot water with the law once again for alleged threats he made against President Donald Trump.
Lopez was arrested on Oct. 28 during a traffic stop conducted by the El Paso Police Department and the FBI over a “federal warrant for making threats against the President,” according to a police department Facebook post.
He was subsequently questioned by FBI and Secret Service agents. Lopez is being charged in federal court and faces a potential five-year sentence if convicted, confirmed in a press release from the Central District of Illinois US Attorney’s Office.
An FBI affidavit noted that Lopez had been interviewed by federal agents prior to his first arrest for social media posts he had made, saying the “agents advised Lopez on the differences between First Amendment protected speech and making threatening communications online and what people may perceive as being threatened.”
This did not stop Lopez, however, as he made an Instagram post on Oct. 26 showing him cocking a handgun and pointing it at a picture of Donald Trump in a crown.
He also made a post the following day with the words “I’m gonna kill Donald Trump, idgaf.” Other public comments and posts from his account celebrated the murder of Charlie Kirk and celebrated calls to violence against ICE agents.
”The threats against President Trump allegedly posted by this individual are heinous and have no place in American society,” FBI Director Kash Patel told Fox News Digital in a statement. “Let this be a message to all who consider threats of violence not just against public officials, but any American, that this FBI will find you and bring you to justice.”
All relevant parties have been contacted for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
