U.S. Secret Service was investigating presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s longtime butler, after Mother Jones reported he wrote on Facebook that he thought President Obama should’ve been killed in his first term.
The campaign went on to say it disavowed the statements the butler made as he continued to critique Obama on Thursday, telling media outlets that he would like to see the president hung from “the portico of the White House,” CNN reported.
Anthony Peter Senecal has long expressed a disdain for Obama in his posts online, according to the report. On Wednesday, Senecal posted that Obama “should have been taken out by our military and shot as an enemy agent in his first term !!!!!”
Here’s the full post, as quoted by Mother Jones:
“To all my friends on FB, just a short note to you on our pus headed “president” !!!! This character who I refer to as zero (0) should have been taken out by our military and shot as an enemy agent in his first term !!!!! Instead he still remains in office doing every thing he can to gut the America we all know and love !!!!! Now comes Donald J Trump to put an end to the corruption in government !!!! The so called elite, who are nothing but common dog turds from your front lawn are shaking in their boots because there is a new Sheriff coming to town, and the end to their corruption of the American people (YOU) is at hand !!!! I cannot believe that a common murder is even allowed to run (killery clinton) OR that a commie like bernie is a also allowed to also run !!!! Come on America put your big boy pants on—this election you have a choice—GET YOUR ASS OUT AND VOTE !!!! Thank you !!!!
That particular post was only visible to Senecal’s friends on the social network, but Senecal confirmed to the publication that he wrote it.
“I cannot stand the bastard,” he told Mother Jones. “I don’t believe he’s an American citizen. I think he’s a fraudulent piece of crap that was brought in by the Democrats.”
A spokeswoman for the Secret Service told TPM Thursday in a statement that the agency was aware of the statement and looking into Senecal.
“The U.S. Secret Service is aware of this matter and will conduct the appropriate investigation,” the spokeswoman said.
Senecal has criticized Obama in other, publicly visible posts on his Facebook profile, including one that called Obama a “rotten filthy muzzie” while clarifying that Senecal’s opinions “do not speak” for Trump:
A spokeswoman for the Trump campaign did not immediately return TPM’s request for comment Thursday afternoon. The campaign told Mother Jones “This individual has not worked at Mar-a-Lago for many years.” The campaign told several other media outlets that he had not worked at the estate and said it disavows from the butler.
Yet Senecal told The New York Times in a wide-ranging interview published in March that he worked as Trump’s butler at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida for nearly 30 years. He has served as an “unofficial historian” at the estate since 2009, when he was relieved of his butler duties after Trump rejected his request to retire, according to the Times.
He stood by his criticisms of the president in interviews with CNN and NBC News. He told CNN that he would like to see Obama “hung from the portico of the White House, or as I call it, the white mosque,”
“Does it sound like I’m nuts? Because I’m not,” he reportedly said. “I’ve just gotten fed up with him.”
The Times article detailed Senecal’s intimate knowledge of everything from Trump’s steak order to his sleep schedule, but gave no hints as to Senecal’s political leanings.
This post has been updated.
