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EXCLUSIVE: John Schneider may now be insisting he never threatened the life of President Joe Biden, but the Secret Service beg to differ.
The federal agency charged with protecting POTUS, the Vice President and their immediate families, as well as major political candidates and high level government officials, have opened a probe into statements the former Dukes of Hazzard star made online against the President and his son Hunter Biden earlier today, Deadline has learned.
Hours after publicly coming up short in the Season 10 finale of The Masked Singer, vocal conservative Schneider called for the execution by hanging of the “treason” guilty president and his indicted offspring. In a now deleted post (yep, he erased it pretty fast), the longtime Biden critic and Smallville actor made no secret of his belief a Donald trump critiquing POTUS should be dead – as a screen grab of that now delated post on X/Twitter reveals:
Seriously, folks?” said Schneider to Deadline today in the second of two statements on his Biden remarks. “This is my final comment on this. I neither said nor implied any such thing. Despite headlines claiming otherwise, in my post, I absolutely did not call for an act of violence or threaten a U.S. president as many other celebrities have done in the past. I suggest you re-read my actual post and pay attention to the words before believing this nonsense.”
“It’s my position, which I am entitled to have, that some of our nations leaders in Washington have lost their way, and corruption runs rampant, both on our nation’s borders and abroad,” Schneider went on to say. “Transparency and accountability must happen in order for our constitutional republic to survive. There is no threat implied or otherwise in that statement.”
Officially, the White House and the Secret Service, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security,are saying nothing on any investigation of Schneider. However, sources close to events confirm a probe is in the preliminary stage.
“We look at all threats against our protectees and, due to intent, this falls under the definition of a threat,” a law enforcement insider informed Deadline Thursday.
A federal Class D felony, a “credible” threat against the president is subject to up to five years behind bars and a $250,000 fine. Restrictions on going online can be applied too by a judge in sentencing, as can three years of supervised release. The law “prohibits knowing and willful threats to kill, kidnap, or inflict bodily harm against” the President, the VP, their predecessors, potential successors and their respective “immediate family.”
If the government deems the threat was real, any “prosecution …would not only require proof that the statement could reasonably be perceived as a threat but would also require some evidence that the maker intended the statement to be a threat,” according to the statute.
A loser on Dancing with the Stars back in 2018, as well as serving a very short jail stint that year for not ponying up alimony to his ex-wife Elvira Castle, charting singer Schneider was the Donut on Masked Singer this season. Schneider’s third wife and manager Alicia Allain passed away earlier this year from breast cancer.
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