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The second mass shooting in the last 24 hours took place in Dayton, Ohio last night when an unidentified man with a .223-caliber rifle, extra magazines, and body armor killed nine people and injured 24 others in the city’s historic Oregon District.
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Coming immediately on the heels of the 20 murders at an El Paso Walmart yesterday by an avowed white nationalist, the distraught public demands for politicians to enact more stringent gun regulations reached a fever pitch.
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Given the obvious importance of the issue, one would think that the fine public servants in our federal and state governments would be eager to appear on the Sunday morning political talk shows that they usually frequent to discuss how they plan to address the plague of gun violence that has devastated our nation for so long.
Jake Tapper, the host of CNN‘s State of the Union, tried to get the politicians representing the states where the latest massacres occurred to appear on his program this morning, but, as he lamented on air, none of the senior Republican politicians from those states had the courage to agree to discuss the gun regulation issue on camera with him.
“We should note we invited the Republican governor, lieutenant governor and both Republican U.S. senators representing Texas this morning, they all declined,” Tapper told the TV audience on Sunday.
“The Republican governor of Ohio also declined. We also asked the White House to provide someone to discuss these shootings, that request too was declined,” Tapper added.
.@jaketapper calls out Republican leaders who declined to appear on #CNNSOTU following two mass shootings in Texas and Ohio. pic.twitter.com/TeZZHHK0Mn
— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) August 4, 2019
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In a Twitter post, Tapper named names, providing a list of those who refused to discuss the issue alongside the Democratic politicians that he had booked for the program and who were fervently advocating gun reform legislation.
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Among those who declined the request from @CNNSotu to come on to discuss the mass shootings:@WhiteHouse
Texas Gov @GregAbbott_TX
Texas LG @DanPatrick
Sen @JohnCornyn
Sen @tedcruz, @GovMikeDeWine, @GOPLeader McCarthy@senatemajldr did not respond to our request.— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) August 4, 2019
The Republican leaders’ decision to forgo an opportunity to defend their position in refusing to advance the type of sensible gun regulations that a majority of Americans wish to see enacted left the airwaves open for the Democrats to advance their message which — in addition to enacting stricter gun laws — included the message that President Trump’s hateful rhetoric towards immigrants and his support of white nationalists is part of the root cause of the recent spate of domestic terrorism by deranged white males.
After the Dayton shootings in his home state, Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) spoke to Tapper about how Trump helped white nationalists feel empowered.
.@SenSherrodBrown: “I guess the thoughts and prayers that my colleagues that always stand with the NRA … I would hope some of my colleagues would, one, stand up to the gun lobby, and second, would actually talk to the President about doing better about all of this.” #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/loA6ggeqxY
— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) August 4, 2019
Presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke who returned to his hometown of El Paso from the campaign trail after yesterday’s massacre went even further in explicitly calling out the president as an unrepentant racist.
Jake Tapper: “Do you think President Trump is a white nationalist?”
Beto O’Rourke: “Yes, I do.” #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/R86FAk5gnb— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) August 4, 2019
Other Democratic presidential candidates weighed in on the issue as well.
Forty Wayne, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg decried political inaction.
2020 presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg on the latest mass shootings: “Every time this happens we say never again. We say we're going to do something. We say it's going to change and it hasn't. … I’m wondering what it will take to get the sense of urgency…” #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/u6a1QuLoCi
— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) August 4, 2019
Senator Corey Booker (D-NJ) laid the blame for the shootings directly at President Trump’s feet.
Cory Booker on latest mass shootings: “I think at the end of the day, especially because this was the white supremacist manifesto… that Donald Trump is responsible for this. He is responsible because he is stoking fears and hatred and bigotry.” #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/k8LBA5SJi2
— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) August 4, 2019
El Paso’s Julián Castro agreed with Senator Booker that Trump’s divisiveness was the primary instigation for the wave of hate crimes the nation has suffered since his inauguration.
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2020 presidential candidate Julián Castro on President Trump during the latest mass shootings: "There is no question that this President is setting a tone of division and fanning the flames of bigotry and hate.” #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/EPxsqj40AE
— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) August 4, 2019
While the Democratic politicians all seem eager to renew their push for universal background checks and automatic weapons bans, their chances of success all hinge on the support of the Republicans who control the Senate.
Given that the senior Republican leadership — even in the states directly affected by the latest vicious terrorist assaults — are all too fearful to even appear on TV to discuss the issue, the prognosis for a solution to gun violence and domestic white nationalist terrorism does not look promising, to say the least.
Follow Vinnie Longobardo on Twitter.
Original reporting by Rebeca Klar at The Hill.
