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Guest Column: Republicans Can’t Selectively Condemn Violence
Jalen Elrod: “There’s rarely, if ever, any grace or empathy from the MAGA movement or conservatives when people they disagree with are met with political violence.”
7 comments
A few points of context and correction are in order, Mr. Elrod:
1. The assassin of the two Minnesota politicians you referenced was not a Trump supporter. He was an appointee of Democrat Tim Waltz. Said assassin also claimed (and while I don’t believe it, but it bears on his intentions) that he was ordered to do the “hit” by Waltz, and that his victims deserved it because they “crossed the isle” to vote with Republicans on some important reform bills. But While Trump did denounce those murders publicly multiple times, you are correct that he did not order flags to be flown at half mast, and he probably should have done that.
2. The burning of the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion was an event that Democrats have tried to somehow push onto the conservative right, because the Governor was a Democrat. The attempt falls short. The fact of the matter is that the attacker publicly criticized both Biden and Trump, had no official party registration, and stated himself that he was motivated by the fact that the Governor was a Jew, not a Democrat. The attacker was a left-leaning Palestinian sympathizer – I wouldn’t go so far as to say he supported Hamas though.
3. Your statement about Kirk claiming black women don’t have brain power and have to steal a white man’s spot is grossly out of context. His statement – made on July 13, 2023 on his namesake show- was talking about a Supreme Court ruling striking down affirmative action in hiring, and he was responding to the statements of four specific black women who publicly stated that they could not have gotten their positions but for affirmative action: Joy Reid, Katangi Brown Jackson, Michelle Obama and Sheila Jackson Lee. Kirk’s specific words were as follows:
“You really have to wonder, in fact, you know, if, if we would have said three weeks ago, Blake, if we would have said that Joy Reed and Michelle Obama and Sheila Jackson Lee and Katangy Brown Jackson were affirmative action picks, we would have been called the racist. But now they’re coming out and they’re saying it for us. They’re coming out and they’re saying I’m only here because of affirmative action. Yeah, we know you do not have the brain processing power to otherwise be taken really seriously. You had to go steal a white person slot to go be taken somewhat seriously.”
Kirk was referring to these four specific Black women throughout the segment, not making a generalization about all Black women. He framed his criticism around their alleged reliance on affirmative action and tied it to their public defenses of the policy, using “you” to address them collectively as examples in his argument against it.
LOL…I get that you REALLY want the assassin of the two Minnesota politicians to be a democrat, but he was a registered Republican as far back as 2004 and his anti abortion stance and religious zealotry would certainly make folks believe otherwise. But go ahead – spin the facts around so you can stay in your safe space.
I don’t “really” want anything but the facts. Cite yours, I will look at them and if you are accurate, I will correct myself.
I mean anyone who has spent any time on the internet was already used to seeing helicopter memes and the like by the alt right so seeing those same people demand blood through calls for civil war, a new crusade, or death camps for anyone engaged in wrongthink is wholly unsurprising. It isn’t even sudden radicalization, a lot of them have openly opined on which side would lose a civil war since Obama took office.
The oligarchs don’t really care about anyone within the working class, but they do appreciate the usefulness of people weaponizing their hate and further deteriorating solidarity. Workers fighting each other produces a clear loser, workers, and a clear winner, owners. Charlie’s entire professional life – assuming you can call a propaganda distributor a professional – was in service to those very same owners.
There is no war but class war.
The “what about us” argument doesn’t work. 21% of liberals condone violence to acheive a means to an end. 4% of conservatives do. We.Are.Not.The.Same
Nice try tho.
LOL – try again.
“The right-wing think tank Cato Institute published its own report last week in the wake of Kirk’s assassination, concluding that 3,599 people “have been murdered in politically motivated terrorist attacks in the United States from January 1, 1975, through September 10, 2025,” with 83% of those deaths occurring during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But, the report continued, “right-wingers are the second most common motivating ideology, accounting for 391 murders and 11 percent of the total” during that time period, accounting for killings by “those motivated by white supremacy, anti-abortion beliefs, involuntary celibacy (incels), and other right-wing ideologies.”
“Left-wing terrorists murdered 65 people, or about 2 percent of the total,” the Cato report continued. “Left-wing terrorists include those motivated by black nationalism, anti-police sentiment, communism, socialism, animal rights, environmentalism, anti-white ideologies, and other left-wing ideologies.”
Facts Matter, but go ahead give us your insight to why the right wing CATO institute is wrong.
All can be summed up by two words of Kasch Patel in his senate hearing : Dylan Roof?