President Donald Trump continues to handle the Parkland shooting just as he handled the tragedies in Charlottesville and Puerto Rico—terribly.
On Saturday night, the Commander-in-Chief decided to use the death of 17 students and teachers at Stoneman Douglas High School on Wednesday to criticize the FBI’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election. “Very sad that the FBI missed all of the many signals sent out by the Florida school shooter,” he wrote. “They are spending too much time trying to prove Russian collusion with the Trump campaign.”
Really?
Add this to the list of terrible missteps Trump has made in the aftermath of the mass shooting. Immediately after Nikolas Cruz murdered 17 people with an AR-15, Trump went on Twitter to blame mental illness and the school for failing to report Cruz’s behavior.
He then gave a televised statement where he failed to mention the word “gun” or allude to any need for gun control or reform.
The new tweet underscores Republicans’ continued effort to deflect attention from the NRA and the topic of gun control. But Trump’s attempt to pivot focus from the FBI’s Russia probe to the FBI’s failure to follow up on tips they received about Nikolas Cruz goes a step further by putting his personal objectives, in this case ending the Russia investigation, above the lives of the teens and teachers who died last week.
This tweet doesn’t exist in a vacuum. On Friday, Robert Mueller indicted 13 Russians for trying to interfere with the 2016 election, a move that suggests progress in the ongoing investigation. He not only fired off this insensitive tweet, but a series of others attacking the Democratic Party, CNN, Barack Obama, and others.
It seems that not even this incredible speech from Stoneman Douglas student and survivor Emma Gonzalez impacted his thoughts about the tragedy. Students, family members of victims, and others are continuing their protest against the NRA, while others criticize Trump online for this new insensitive tweet.
