President Donald Trump smiles as he speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Tuesday, May 20, 2025, in Washington (AP Photo/Alex Brandon).
Federal authorities say a Texas man has been charged after allegedly making threats to injure, kidnap, and kill President Donald Trump, along with several other individuals.
Ronnie “Chip” Austin Jr., 56, faces two federal counts: one for making threats against the president and those in the line of succession, and another for using interstate communications to threaten kidnapping or bodily harm. The charges appear in a four-page indictment returned Wednesday in the Eastern District of Texas and made public Friday.
Prosecutors allege Austin sent a series of emails to unnamed recipients in which he made graphic and explicit threats. According to the indictment, the messages were sent between March 16 and May 17 of this year.
One of the emails opened with a direct message aimed at the president: “My life has been threatened by the actions of the CIA and the FBI, and by legal extension, YOU, the President of the USA,” the email states. “So, I hereby am threatening you Mr. President! I am an active threat, a clear and present danger to the President of the USA.”
Investigators say Austin also claimed that a range of federal institutions — including the CIA, FBI, IRS, and even the U.S. Supreme Court — had been working against his life and livelihood.
In that same email, he allegedly argued that those actions gave him the right to respond with force. “Because of the lawbreaking of all of these USA federal entities against me, I can legally defend myself against them,” the message says. “This means that I, and my delegates and representatives (my supporters) can kill these people in self-defense.”
The charging document, citing the email, also contains a subheading in all-caps and bold letters reading: “PREPARE TO BE ATTACKED.”
The next section of the email reads, at length:
President Trump, I suggest that you order the USA military and/or the National Guard to surround all installations of these government entities to defend them. This will make it easier for me and my delegates and representatives to kill them in my self-defense! If any of these people (that you or anyone else of USA’s federal government orders to defend these installations) takes any actions against me or my supporters, they will be breaking USA federal law and going against the U.S. Constitution. Mr. President, Congress, and Supreme Court, YOU have caused this constitutional crisis!
The second count of the charging document clarifies that Austin made the alleged threats “from the State of Texas to the State of Arizona” in “a communication” containing the aforementioned email “among other material.”
That is, the second allegation wholly reiterates the language said to have been used by the defendant in the first count while suggesting that perhaps something more than an email was sent.
The second count also identifies the targets as “employees of Raytheon and other businesses, members of state and county government in the State of Texas, employees of the Defense Logistics Agency, employees of the United States Air Force, members of Congress, and the President of the United States.”
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Texas announced the charges in a press release last week.
“This case is part of Operation Take Back America, a nationwide initiative that marshals the full resources of the Department of Justice to repel the invasion of illegal immigration, to achieve the total elimination of cartels and transnational criminal organizations (TCOs), and to protect our communities from the perpetrators of violent crime,” the press release reads.
Austin was arrested on June 4 and is being represented by the Federal Public Defender’s Office, court records show.
