By Dave Workman
In the wake of Wednesday’s horrific shooting at the Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis which claimed the lives of two children and left 17 others wounded, the killer almost predictably didn’t get blamed so much as guns, by Democrat politicians ranging from a mayor to members of Congress.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, quoted by the Daily Mail, declared, “Anybody who is using this as an opportunity to villainize our trans community or any other community out there has lost their sense of common humanity. We should not be operating out of a place of hate for anyone.”
Instead, in an interview with PBS, Frey pivoted toward villainizing guns.
“We have too many guns in America,” Frey stated. “When you have more guns than you have people, you have got a problem. When people are able to get guns that are in some form of severe mental health crisis, you got a problem.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) wrote on “X” that, “Weapons of war have no place in our neighborhoods, streets or schools.”
And Fox News quoted Rep. Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.) who posted on social media, “Events like these should not be our ‘normal.’ The simple solution is to pass sensible gun control. Without that, these tragedies will continue to happen, and children will continue to die.”
One national gun rights organization—the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms—immediately responded to the Democrats in a statement released to the press Wednesday.
“CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb said he is “disgusted, but not surprised” with the swiftness anti-gunners displayed by calling for gun control in a state which already has adopted gun laws that were pushed by the gun prohibition lobby on the grounds they would prevent such tragedies,” the statement said. “These include, but are not limited to, “expanded background checks” and bans on guns in schools, which failed to prevent Wednesday’s tragedy.”
“It came as no surprise to see anti-gun-rights stalwarts Senator Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries try to blame guns rather than the deranged individual who perpetrated this outrage,” Gottlieb said. “There are hundreds of thousands of Minnesota gun owners who have harmed nobody, but who invariably are penalized by default because they exercise their rights under both the state and federal constitutions.
“The killer reportedly used a rifle, shotgun and handgun,” Gottlieb noted, “yet Schumer and Jeffries are demanding that so-called ‘weapons of war’ should be banned. Apparently, they’re suggesting that all guns are weapons of war, and therefore should be banned, which is what they’ve been wanting all along.
“We are certain to hear many more details about the shooter in the days ahead,” he added, “but it is unlikely the gun control crowd will ever acknowledge their restrictive measures didn’t work, because they couldn’t possibly work, and tragedies like this prove it. There is nothing ‘common sense’ about restricting the rights of law-abiding citizens while leaving schools and places of worship vulnerable to horrific, inexplicable acts of such viciousness.”
As if to underscore Gottlieb’s remarks, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara stated on NBC’s “Today” show Thursday, “Everything that we seen so far is really a classic pathway to an active shooter. We have seen a whole lot of hate against a whole variety of people and what we have seen so far, but nothing specific to point to as the motive for targeting this church and this particular incident.”
The killer was identified as Robin Westman, formerly Robert Westman, whose gender identity was changed when he was 17, according to published reports. He had attended the Annunciation Catholic School, according to the New York Post, and hours before the deadly attack, the 23-year-old Westman “posted a series of twisted videos on YouTube, which included a manifesto,” the newspaper reported.
Among the things Westman reportedly stated was this: “I am feeling good about Annunciation. It seems like a good combo of easy attack form and devastating tragedy and I want to do more research. I have concerns about finding a large enough group. I want to avoid any parents, but pre and post school drop off.”
The New York Post report carried photographs of Westman and other parts of the story including an image taken from a YouTube video showing a magazine for his rifle with the names of other mass killers inscribed. Another image shows the front end of a shotgun and two handguns, a semi-auto and a revolver, along with several rifle and pistol magazines, all emblazoned apparently by the killer. All of the firearms were reportedly purchased legally, so Westman had to have passed Minnesota’s background checks.
Perhaps CCRKBA’s Gottlieb supplied the postscript for the tragedy when he noted, “The monster responsible for Wednesday’s mayhem followed an all-too-familiar pattern of apparently taking his own life. He has escaped punishment, at least in this life, and there is no reason for anti-gunners to propose any sanctions against the state’s law-abiding gun owners just because they need a whipping boy, and to create the illusion they are ‘doing something’ to prevent such crimes.
“Our thoughts and prayers are for the victims of this tragedy,” he observed, “while our good sense tells us to remain vigilant against those who would shamelessly exploit the acts of one individual in their ongoing effort to deprive honest Minnesotans of their rights.”
Workman is editor-in-chief at TheGunMag.com
