TMZ reports that a man in Washington state was arrested today for making death threats against Ben Shapiro and his family.

Law enforcement sources tell us, Shapiro, who frequently appears on cable news shows and has a hugely popular podcast, filed a police report with the LAPD…

We’re told the Department got in touch with the FBI and created a joint task force to hunt down the culprit…

We’re told these threats were “extremely serious” … not just someone blowing off steam.

Shapiro confirmed the gist of TMZ’s report by tweeting a link to the story and thanking law enforcement:

Thanks to local and federal law enforcement for their quick and hard work here. Stay safe out there, everyone! https://t.co/XHR4wpDo5c

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) May 1, 2019

Just a couple of weeks ago there was a tremendous concern on the left about death threats received by Rep. Ilhan Omar. As I noted at the time, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and MSNBC’s Chris Hayes both accused President Trump of endangering Omar’s life:

The President is actively and willfully endangering the life of a member of Congress.

— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) April 12, 2019

Members of Congress have a duty to respond to the President’s explicit attack today.@IlhanMN’s life is in danger. For our colleagues to be silent is to be complicit in the outright, dangerous targeting of a member of Congress.

We must speak out.

“First they came…” pic.twitter.com/ygOX1vhE9j

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) April 12, 2019

The President is inciting violence against a sitting Congresswoman—and an entire group of Americans based on their religion. It's disgusting. It's shameful. And any elected leader who refuses to condemn it shares responsibility for it.

— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) April 13, 2019

That was in response to a short video Trump tweeted featuring Omar’s dismissive words about 9/11 paired with images of the attack. Here’s what I wrote at the time about these partisan attacks:

Do people like Hayes and Ocasio-Cortez, who suggest the right is creating a dangerous climate of hate, believe that’s ever the case on the left? Is Bernie Sanders responsible for the shooting of Rep. Scalise? No, of course not, they’ll say. Is Black Lives Matter responsible for the shooting of police officers in Dallas or Baton Rouge or New York? Of course not, they’ll say. So it seems this is just another way for partisans to attempt to silence their opponents. They won’t use this standard for themselves but they seek to apply it to others…

Look, it’s possible some right-wing nut out there will do something crazy. There are some crazy people out there. It’s also possible some left-wing nut will try to kill the president or the Koch Brothers or Sean Hannity or any other person the left really hates with a burning passion.

And here we are two weeks later and some left-wing nut has been arrested for threatening Ben Shapiro and his family. Do any of the people who were banging on about incitement two weeks ago have anything to say? Is Chris Hayes going to tell people on the left to tone down the Shapiro hate? Is Elizabeth Warren going to describe this as shameful and possibly anti-Semitic? I mean, there are plenty of hot-buttons to go around on this one. Isn’t it strange no one on the left is eager to explore them?

My guess is that most of these folks won’t say anything because this isn’t something they really believe apart from having the right villain and the right victim. When the situation is reversed, as it is here, the climate of hate vanishes into the ether. It’s one of the most reliable double-standards in politics and the media rarely seems to notice its existence.