A Twitter user who threatened to kill Mitt Romney on the social media site earlier in the month has been identified as 15-year-old Kyle Stusse, Twitchy reported Tuesday.
"If [R]omney is elected, I will assassinate him," he wrote on Oct 3.
"I want to kill Romney more and more every day," he said on Sunday, promising that "someone will go bye bye" when he snaps.
Both tweets were deleted on Sunday night, but the damage had already been done.
According to Twitchy, "Stusse faced a backlash over his vile tweets and was apparently contacted by the Secret Service" after the story broke.
"A death threat is a death threat, and regardless of Stusse’s age, it deserves to be taken seriously," the Twitchy staff added.
But, Twitchy added, one of his "friends" disagreed.
"Kyle actually has Secret Service coming for him Haha. He is freaking out (sic)," tweeted"Cheddar Bob."
Instead of calling his friend out for the threatening tweets, "Cheddar Bob" went after those who were offended by the illegal messages.
"Do these people have a life other than harassing @kyle__kyle ? Leave the kid alone (sic)," hetweeted, before launching a new hashtag.
According to Twitchy, the hashtag "#FreeKyle" gained some momentum.
One of Stusse's supporters felt that some took the death threats too seriously.
"Hey wanna hear something funny? Grown adults that take a tweet to far! Your to old to be on twitter anyways (sic)," tweeted "Matthew."
A federal law says that anyone who threatens "a major candidate for the office of President or Vice President, or a member of the immediate family of such candidate" can face up to five years in prison and/or be fined.
Stusse said in later tweets that his message was a "joke" and promised not to issue threats like that again.
"The road to maturity is clearly a very long one for Stusse. And while his contrition is likely genuine (it’s amazing what a reality check can do), he needs to understand that actions have consequences — at any age," Twitchy concluded.
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