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Democrats have joined in denouncing the assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University on Wednesday, but many have also used it as an opportunity to promote gun control, even while pushing back on attempts to honor him.
“I believe that if we want to stop the scourge of violence in this country, we must do our jobs and pass commonsense gun safety reforms in the United States,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., told reporters Wednesday when asked about Republican charges that Democrats have too often disparaged Republicans as “Nazis.”
“We are in an environment of escalated rhetoric, but a person who hears this rhetoric should not be able, if they have a history of domestic violence, if they have a history of descending into what seems to be a violent spiral, should not have access to a gun,” said Ocasio-Cortez when further pressed on the issue, adding:
And the idea that one would weaponize this environment when people are able in some states to get a gun who should not?
It’s not about taking away people’s right to a firearm. This is about ensuring that we have responsible gun laws in the United States of America, and anything else is a deflection.
Republicans have pushed back strongly on that narrative.
The solution “is not taking our guns away,” Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., told reporters Wednesday. “We got our Second Amendments rights. We’re going to hold fast to them. The campus where Charlie Kirk was assassinated was a gun-free campus.”
Additionally, some Democrats have criticized providing posthumous honors to Kirk.
The Daily Signal asked Rep. Sean Casten, D-Ill., for his response to President Donald Trump saying he planned to posthumously award Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
“That is the opposite of bringing the rhetoric down,” Casten told The Daily Signal. “Like, I have tremendous sadness and sympathy for the family, for the Kirk family, for what’s happened. But this is a guy who was raising money to support the guy who attacked Paul Pelosi in his home, right? There are voices we can choose to elevate in our society and celebrate with things with the dignity of the Congressional Medal of Freedom, and there are voices that we do just to elevate and amplify the rhetoric.”
Casten was likely referencing an off-handed, likely sarcastic, 2022 remark from Kirk on his podcast that someone should bail out the attacker of the husband of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in order to ask him questions about the attack.
Rep. Sean Casten, D-Ill. ( Bryan Dozier/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., also criticized Kirk after his slaying.
“What I do know for sure—Charlie was someone who once said, ‘Guns save lives,’ after a school shooting. Charlie was someone who was willing to debate and downplay the death of George Floyd,” Omar said in an interview. “There is nothing more ‘effed up’ than to pretend than to completely pretend that his words and actions have not been recorded and in existence.”
Casten’s and Omar’s remarks are in sharp contrast with those Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., who told The Daily Signal that Congress should honor Kirk.
“You have few people in our history that can create a movement of millions upon millions, especially young people, like he did. People like Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks—I think Charlie’s name will be one of those that goes alongside historically these individuals,” Burlison said.
“Regardless of what you think about his views, we all need to emulate his style. He loved the people that disagreed with him, and he treated them with extreme respect and dignity … . We need to follow his example.”
Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., has introduced legislation to grant Kirk a posthumous Congressional Gold Medal, which is the highest honor that Congress can award a civilian.
Jacob Adams contributed to this report.
The post In Wake of Kirk Killing, Dems Push for Gun Control, Question Merit for Presidential Medal appeared first on The Daily Signal.
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