Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) called on FBI Director Christopher Wray and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to open a federal hate crime investigation into the Monday shooting at a Christian elementary school in Nashville, Tennessee.
Police say a 28-year-old woman who identified as a transgender man killed three 9-year-old children and three adults at The Covenant School, which is associated with the conservative evangelical Covenant Presbyterian Church. Authorities revealed that the shooter, whom The Daily Wire will not name in accordance with company policy, executed a “targeted attack” and left behind a “manifesto.”
Hawley contended that the nature of the fatal shooting might indicate a specific desire to harm Christians. “Yesterday the nation witnessed the vicious murder of small schoolchildren in Nashville, Tennessee,” he wrote in a letter to the senior Biden administration officials. “It is commonplace to call such horrors ‘senseless violence.’ But properly speaking, that is false. Police report that the attack here was ‘targeted’ — targeted, that is, against Christians.”
The Republican lawmaker added that federal law criminalizes acts of violence based on their actual or perceived “religion.” Police detectives believe the shooter had “some resentment” for having to attend that school.
“I urge you to immediately open an investigation into this shooting as a federal hate crime,” Hawley continued. “The full resources of the federal government must be brought to bear to determine how this crime occurred, and who may have influenced the deranged shooter to carry out these horrific crimes. Hate that leads to violence must be condemned. And hate crimes must be prosecuted.”
via madpatriotnews
