‘It’s Not About Mean Tweets’: Fingers Point at Trump In Minn. Shooting
Two Democrats were targeted by gunman in pre-dawn hours Saturday
With Gov Tim Walz clearly labeling the weekend shooting of two Democratic state legislators in Minnesota as “a politically motivated assassination,” fingers are being pointed back to Donald Trump and his rhetoric as a root cause of the attack.
No one is claiming that Trump had any direct involvement in the attack, which left a woman and her husband dead, while leaving a nearby man and his wife hospitalized.
Melissa Hortman, a Minnesota state and leader of the state house Democratic caucus, was shot and killed at her home in Brooklyn Park, Minn, in the pre-dawn hours of Saturday. Her husband was killed in the same attack. Meanwhile, earlier that morning state Sen John Hoffman and and his wife, Yvette, were also shot in their home in nearby Champlin, and have been hospitalized.
A suspect, Vance Luther Boelter, has been taken into custody, and the shootings are being investigated with a possible motive being the suspect’s reported anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ views. He is said to have voted for Trump.
The political implications of these crimes have not gone unnoticed.
“A moment in this country where we watched violence erupt — this cannot be the norm. It cannot be the way that we deal with our political differences,” said Walz, who last year was the Democratic Party nominee for vice president. “Now is the time for us to recommit to the core values of this country. And each and every one of us can do it. Talk to a neighbor rather than arguing. Debate an issue. Shake hands. Find common ground. This is who Melissa Hortman was.
“In the first negotiating session that I had a chance to work with her, she got all the partners in the room and she provided each and every one of us a copy of a book called Getting to Yes,” Walz added. “And the whole premise was debating with a sense of goodwill, a sense of trying to come to compromises that serve everyone. And because of her, we did that. Because of her, we did that year after year after year. That’s the embodiment of how things are supposed to work.
“It’s not about hatred. It’s not about mean tweets. It’s not about demeaning someone. It’s leading with grace and compassion and vision and compromise and decency. That was taken from us in Minnesota,” he said.
Walz’s reference to “mean tweets” was an unmistakable reference to Trump and Trump’s style of governance.
Rep Adam Smith (D-Wash) was even more direct in talking about Trump relative to this crime.
“My biggest concern is that we as a society are normalizing political violence. And you see this in many points on the political spectrum,” he said. “The denigration and attacking of elected officials that you disagree with. It becomes incredibly — it’s hateful and dehumanizing.
“And it puts in people’s minds the idea that violence is an acceptable way to carry out your political viewpoints. And you see this in much of the dialogue that we have,” Smith added. “No one side of the political spectrum has a monopoly on it. It’s certainly — you’ve seen it on the right and the left. But President Trump is the biggest problem here.
“I mean, he has used hateful, degrading rhetoric from the day he decided to run for president. And then pardoning all of the January 6 attackers at the U.S. Capitol, people who thought that violence was a legitimate way to overturn an election, and Donald Trump gave them a big stamp of approval,” he said. “You also heard Trump muttering about possibly pardoning the people who attempted to kidnap the governor of Michigan.
“Look, if Donald Trump and the Republican Party want this kind of thing to stop, they need to change their rhetoric and stop pardoning people who commit acts that are dangerous to this,” Smith added. “Look, representative democracy’s dependent upon people running for office and holding those offices. If you think running for office means that you’re a legitimate target for violence, that significantly undermines our representative democracy. And I am deeply worried about it. And I hope all of our leaders will begin to change that rhetoric.”
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