Maryland Man Arrested For Allegedly Threatening To Kidnap & Kill Joe Biden, Kamala Harris

A Maryland man was arrested on Wednesday by authorities after he threatened to kidnap and kill both Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and his running mate, California Sen. Kamala Harris.

According to The New York Times, the complaint against the man, known as James Dale Reed, claimed that he had approached a house in Frederick, Maryland, that had Biden-Harris campaign signs displayed in the yard. He left a note that included violent and graphic details about kidnapping and hurting both the candidates and their supporters.

“We are the ones with these scary guns, we are the ones your children have nightmares about,” one part of the missive warned.

Reed’s identity was discovered via a camera on the doorbell that captured his actions. He was later arrested and charged with threatening a major candidate, a federal offense. Reed confessed to writing the letter and provided both a palm print and handwriting sample. He could face five years in prison if convicted.

In addition, Reed was also charged with threatening mass violence and voter intimidation under state law. Authorities noted that he had been on the radar of law enforcement since 2014 after filing a complaint against a person under Secret Service protection.

However, the Secret Service acknowledged that Reed had not made any concrete actions regarding his threat, unlike other plots that authorities have foiled against political figures throughout the years.

The city of Frederick is located northwest of Washington, D.C. It leans slightly Republican, with the city voting for Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton in 2016 by around 2.4 percentage points. Maryland overall is considered a liberal stronghold and has voted almost exclusively for Democratic presidential candidates since 1960 — with the exceptions being the landslide victories of Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and George H.W. Bush.

The report comes as Americans have lamented a more and more polarized atmosphere as voters prepare for the 2020 presidential election on November 3. In fact, The Independent reported that three quarters of Americans have expressed fears about violent post-election riots and protests. The fears were aggravated by the fact that voters were “very or quite concerned” that the winner would not be apparent by November 4 due to delays in mail-in ballot voting.

The former Delaware senator is not the only candidate to have received death threats. Just under one month ago, a Canadian woman was arrested after sending ricin to the White House in an attempt to kill President Donald Trump. As was previously covered by The Inquisitr, the package was intercepted by law enforcement before it reached the intended target.