Democracy Dies in Darkness

What is swatting, the tactic being used to target Trump Cabinet picks?

Trump’s transition team said that “several” of the president-elect’s picks faced “threats to their lives.” Such “swatting” incidents have proven difficult to stop.

6 min
A SWAT team responds to a protest in Huntington Beach, California, in April 2021. (Etienne Laurent/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
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Some of President-elect Donald Trump’s picks for key government roles have been victims of “numerous bomb threats and swatting incidents,” the FBI said Wednesday — calling renewed attention to a dangerous intimidation tactic that high-profile figures have faced for years, and which has proved stubbornly difficult to stop.

“Swatting” — a form of harassment in which authorities are misled to believe that a serious threat or crime is underway, leading police to an urgent response, often at the target’s home — has caused scenes so chaotic that a Tennessee man once suffered a fatal heart attack after he was targeted, while another man was shot dead by police in Kansas.