MLB Umpire Rob Drake Is Prepared To Shoot People In Defense Of Donald Trump [Update]

Major League umpire and apparent MAGA fiend Rob Drake posted and deleted a tweet late Tuesday indicating that he would be purchasing an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle on Wednesday in order to wage “CIVAL WAR” should Congress impeach peabrain president Donald Trump. Going to go out on a limb here and assume that “CIVAL” means “civil,” and that Rob Drake is fantasizing about shooting the libs.

The tweet was evidently wiped out within moments of going live—I can’t even find a screenshot of it—but not before it was reportedly forwarded to MLB. The league told ESPN’s Jeff Passan that they are aware of the tweet and someone on their end is “looking into it.” Not long after ESPN’s report went live Wednesday evening, Drake made his Twitter account private, and then minutes later deleted the entire thing. The original bad tweet was reported in full by Passan, for ESPN:

I will be buying an AR-15 tomorrow, because if you impeach MY PRESIDENT this way, YOU WILL HAVE ANOTHER CIVAL WAR!!! #MAGA2020”

After that tweet was deleted, several others expanding on the point were still live on Drake’s account, including one that lamented “an impeachment inquiry from the basement of Capital Hill without even a vote,” and a tweet from Wednesday afternoon that repeated a bunch of dreary FOX News talking points:

Drake has been a full-time umpire in the majors since 2010, but was left off the postseason rotation for these playoffs. A quick scan of Drake’s Twitter timeline before it was scrubbed showed a lot of the usual MAGA paranoia, but the real action appears to have been found in his favorites, where an adventurous Deadspin reader noted and screencapped a lot of horniness:

One thing to look forward to in our future with robot umpires is that they are not likely to go nuts on propaganda and load up on assault rifles to wage civil war. It seems much more probable that their violent overthrow of civilization will be waged using built-in flamethrowers or laser eyes.

UPDATE (Oct. 24): Drake sent a statement to ESPN Thursday, acknowledging “the violence in those words” and apologizing to “everyone that [his] words made feel less safe.”

[ ESPN]