Nicholas Riccio is the husband of White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, and the comments he made Saturday evening, just seconds before a man began shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, are raising eyebrows and fueling conspiracy theories on social media.
According to Fox News reporter Aishah Hasnie, Riccio turned to her. “He was seated right next to me, and right as the dinner was starting, he leaned over and said, ‘I’ve watched you on TV, you do a great job – you need to be very safe. And he was very serious when he said that to me, and he kind of looked around the room, and he said, ‘There are some…’
Also, something Leavitt herself said before entering the venue for the dinner seems oddly out of place, with the press secretary predicting, “I will tell you this speech tonight will be classic Donald J. Trump. It’ll be funny. It’ll be entertaining. There will be some shots fired tonight.”
“Everyone should tune in. It’s going to be really great.”
However, it was the exchange between Hasnie and Riccio that drew the most comments online, with some suggesting the press secretary’s husband might have had advance knowledge, and the entire incident had been a staged event meant to elicit sympathy for Trump, whose poll numbers are in the toilet as the midterm elections draw closer by the day.
Of course, to accept that the White House set this entire scenario up at a time when Trump and the GOP’s poll numbers are tanking would require us to believe that the administration is trying to change the subject from the quagmire of the Iran war, struggling U.S. economy, and a sense among the public that the country is heading in the wrong direction.
There’s no way even someone as devious as Trump would ever pull such a stunt, is there?
Butler, Pennsylvania, is on the phone and would like a word.
