Boston Herald
By ANDREW MARTINEZ |
PUBLISHED: August 4, 2019 at 8:15 p.m. | UPDATED: August 19, 2019 at 2:48 p.m.
U.S. Rep Stephen Lynch on Sunday said President Trump’s rhetoric on illegal immigrants may “feed a certain attitude” in the wake of a mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, the feds are treating as a potential hate crime.
Lynch, speaking in South Boston after a recent trip to the El Paso border with a congressional delegation, said the president’s demonization of illegal immigrants, including calling them “rapists and murderers” has not been helpful.
“At the very least it’s not helpful and probably does feed a certain attitude out there,” Lynch said. “It is deeply unfortunate. We don’t need that now.”
Investigators are working to determine if a racist, anti-immigrant manifesto posted online was written by Patrick Crusius, 21, of Allen, Texas, the man arrested in the shooting and killing of 20 people Saturday in El Paso. The dead included at least three Mexican citizens.
A second mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, early Sunday morning left nine dead and dozens injured. Police did not initially release a motive.
Connor Betts, 24, of Ohio, killed his sister and eight others in less than 30 seconds before police fatally shot him, a local police chief said. Authorities said Betts was wearing a bulletproof vest, a mask, hearing protection and carrying at least 100 rounds when he started shooting a .223-caliber rifle in the streets of Dayton’s historic Oregon District about 1 a.m. in the second U.S. mass shooting in less than 24 hours.
Lynch said white supremacy should be fought as actively and aggressively as any other hate crime, and condemned the president’s comments after Charlottesville, Va., in which Trump said there were “very fine people” on both sides at a white nationalist rally in which a woman was killed by a white supremacist who plowed his car into counter-demonstrators.
“That type of false equivalency is totally unacceptable,” Lynch said. “It might be seen as going soft on some very bad people.”
Lynch is set to discuss gun legislation when Congress reconvenes in September, saying he had no doubt the Democratic House could pass some meaningful bills.
“Right now the NRA has a stranglehold on the Senate,” he said. “I think we can pass some things in the House, but far too many bills are already sitting over in the Senate waiting for action. Congress has the ability to act, and we should.”
The congressman also said he hopes the Democratic nominee running against Trump for the 2020 presidential race will be able to counteract the president’s use of the immigration issue to stoke fear and motivate his base.
“If people understand the issue more deeply they’ll realize that the way he has characterized immigrants coming to this country is baseless,” Lynch said. “It is false, it is mean spirited, it is bigoted and it’s wrong.”
Herald news services contributed to this story.
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