United States President Donald Trump has called for criminal charges of “incitement to violence” against top Democratic lawmaker Hakeem Jeffries, escalating his push to use the legal system against his political rivals.

Trump shared a social media post on Thursday attempting to link past comments by the minority leader in the House of Representatives to the White House correspondents’ dinner shooting incident that prosecutors said targeted the US president.

“This lunatic, Hakeem ‘Low IQ’ Jeffries, should be charged with INCITING VIOLENCE! The Radical Left Democrats actually want to Destroy our Country,” Trump wrote.

Since returning to the White House last year, the US president has successfully pushed for criminal charges against political opponents, including New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey.

Thursday’s post showed an image of Jeffries standing next to a poster saying, “Maximum warfare everywhere all the time”, side-by-side with a photo of the alleged press gala gunman approaching a security checkpoint.

But Jeffries’ remarks and poster were not about political violence. The House minority leader was referring to the partisan fight over redistricting after voters in Virginia approved an electoral map that favours Democrats.

Gerrymandering standoff

In a news conference on April 22, Jeffries hailed the vote in Virginia and accused Republicans of launching a “gerrymandering war”, referring to efforts to draw partisan electoral maps.

Trump has been publicly pressuring state Republican officials to draw US House maps that boost the party’s chance of retaining control of the legislative chamber in the midterm elections in November.

Jeffries pledged that Democrats would respond in the states they control, as they have in Virginia and California, while also pushing back against Republican-drawn maps.

“We are in an era of maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time,” he told reporters. “And we are going to keep the pressure on Republicans at every single state in the union, to ensure at the end of the day, that there is a fair, national map.”

Three days after the top Democrat’s comments, an alleged gunman tried to run through a security checkpoint at the White House press dinner in what prosecutors say was an assassination attempt against Trump.

Republicans were quick to point to Jeffries’ “warfare” quote to accuse Democrats of violent rhetoric.

But last week, the Democratic legislator said he stands by his comment against criticism from what he called “phoney Republicans”.

“You can continue to criticise me for it. I don’t give a damn about your criticism,” Jeffries said.

The Democratic leader may have borrowed his “warfare” line from Republicans. “One person close to the president, who insisted on anonymity to describe the White House’s political strategy candidly, summed it up succinctly: ‘Maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time,'” a New York Times article on gerrymandering read last year.

Trump-Jeffries rivalry

Trump’s call on Thursday for charges against Jeffries came after federal prosecutors secured a grand jury indictment against former FBI Director Comey once more, this time over accusations that he threatened to kill Trump.

Last year, Trump posted a message to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi, pressuring her to pursue criminal charges against Comey and New York’s James, as well as several others.

Previous charges of lying to Congress against Comey had been dismissed; a judge also dropped charges of fraud against James, ruling that the special prosecutor in both cases had been appointed illegally.

While the First Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, the law prohibits death threats.

It is also a crime to “solicit, command, induce, or otherwise endeavour to persuade” people to commit crimes. But it would be difficult to prosecute individuals for incitement over general statements.

Critics have accused Trump – who faced criminal charges himself after his first term over allegations of attempting to overthrow the 2020 elections, mishandling secret government documents, and illegally paying off an adult-film actress – of weaponising the justice system.

Jeffries has been a frequent target of Trump’s attacks. Last week, the US president called the Democratic legislator, who is Black, a “thug” and a “danger” to the country.

Coinciding with the Cinco de Mayo Mexican holiday on Tuesday, the White House shared a meme of Jeffries and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer in sombreros with a sign that reads, “I love illegal immigrants.”

Schumer responded with a real image of Trump with the late sex offender Jeffry Epstein with the same hat superimposed on the photo.