In the wake of the massacre at Colorado Springs’s Club Q, far-right Congresswoman Lauren Boebert is complaining of being “blamed” by left-wing critics for mass shootings and political violence across the US.
Ms Boebert, who recently eked out the narrowest of re-election wins in what was thought to be a safely Republican district, tweeted her condolences after the massacre, but immediately found herself being called out for offering sympathies to the victims of the shooting after a long history of virulently anti-LGBT remarks.
Speaking on far-right network OAN, which since its inception has regularly featured extremist voices including conspiracy theorists and racist agitators.
“I have been accused of just about every mass shooting there has been since the left has learned of my name,” the congresswoman complained. “Whether it’s Uvalde, or the King Soopers shooting in Boulder, Colorado, or the Buffalo, New York shooting. Or even Paul Pelosi getting hammered…
“It has to come to an end, this blame game. You know, I think the left is pissed that I won my election, and so they’re trying to find something to go after me about. I expressed my concern for the families, for the victims, and the way that they came after me is absolutely disgusting.”
Ms Boebert’s latest complaint echoes one she made on Colorado’s KOA radio earlier this week, a discussion in which she told the host “I have never had bad rhetoric towards anyone and their personal preference as an adult”, insisting that “What I’ve criticised is the sexualization of our children. And I’ve criticised men dressing up as caricatures of women.”
The distinction she drew in that interview is one that her critics deny as false. Club Q owner Nic Grzecka has pointed to the rise in the political targeting of drag queens and trans people in particular as a “new kind of hate”, one that puts them at risk of violence from people who have been convinced they are pedophiles and child groomers.
“Lying about our community, and making them into something they are not, creates a different type of hate,” he told the Associated Press.
Such claims that LGBT+ venues and events amount to arenas for child abuse under the protection of “woke” political correctness are exactly what Ms Boebert has circulated in recent years, referring to “sick, demented groomers” and repeatedly painting LGBT teachers as hellbent on sexualising schoolchildren in a threat to Christian parents’ way of life.
Here is a small sample of her tweets about the issue:
Along with the scores of Twitter users who have lambasted Ms Boebert for deigning to offer her sympathies to the Club Q victims, her congressional colleague Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has also weighed in.
“@laurenboebert you have played a major role in elevating anti-LGBT+ hate rhetoric and anti-trans lies while spending your time in Congress blocking even the most common sense gun safety laws,” tweeted the progressive congresswoman. “You don’t get to “thoughts and prayers” your way out of this. Look inward and change.”
