Seven months before he was charged with shooting and killing two BLM supporters protesting the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin, 17-year old Kyle Rittenhouse was in the front row at a Trump re-election campaign rally in Des Moines, Iowa.
“Kyle Howard Rittenhouse’s social media presence is filled with him posing with weapons, posting ‘Blue Lives Matter,’ and supporting Trump for president,” Buzzfeed News reports. “Footage from the Des Moines, Iowa, rally on Jan. 30 shows Rittenhouse feet away from the president, in the front row, to the left of the podium. He posted a TikTok video from the event.”
Police in Kenosha shot 29-year old Jacob Blake, at least seven times, at point-blank range, in the back on August 23. Protests began immediately.
Rittenhouse, a Blue Lives Matter supporter, allegedly shot and killed two protestors and injured a third on August 25.
“Rittenhouse went with his rifle to the third night of Black Lives Matter protests in Kenosha after police shot Blake, a Black man who is now paralyzed as a result, according to his family,” Buzzfeed adds. “Rittenhouse attended as an armed vigilante, supposedly assisting police and protecting property in an unofficial capacity. Instead, he allegedly prowled the protest with a gun. Videos captured him fraternizing with law enforcement and attempting to get their attention.”
The Trump campaign was forced to issue a statement saying, “This individual had nothing to do with our campaign.”
“Rittenhouse wrote “BLUE LIVES MATTER 🔵” and “Trump 2020 🇺🇸 🇺🇸” in his TikTok bio,” Buzzfeed notes.