Giffords’ Husband Rips Arizona Governor at Loughner Sentencing
In a statement to the court, the husband of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords blasted Jan Brewer for her "feckless" leadership on the issue of gun control.
Mark Kelly had some harsh words for Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer on Thursday at the sentencing of the man who shot and nearly killed his wife, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. In a statement to the court, Kelly blasted Brewer for her “feckless” leadership on the issue of gun control. The Republican governor, who was not at the hearing, said she would not respond to Kelly’s criticism on such a “solemn occasion.”
Politico:
Kelly launched the broadside at Brewer at the sentencing of Jared Loughner, who pleaded guilty to 11 charges linked to the January 2011 shooting at a Safeway in Tucson that left six people dead and Giffords with grave injuries that eventually forced her to resign from Congress. About halfway through his testimony, Kelly criticized Brewer and the rest of the country’s political class for failing to control gun violence.
“In this state we have elected officials so feckless in their leadership that they would say, as in the case of Governor Jan Brewer, ‘I don’t think it has anything to do with the size of the magazine or the caliber of the gun,’” Kelly said, according to a prepared copy of his remarks e-mailed to reporters. “She went on and said, ‘Even if the shooter’s weapon had held fewer bullets, he’d have another gun, maybe. He could have three guns in his pocket’ – she said this just one week after a high capacity magazine allowed you to kill six and wound 19 others, before being wrestled to the ground while attempting to reload. Or a state legislature that thought it appropriate to busy itself naming an official Arizona state gun just weeks after this tragedy occurred, instead of doing the work it was elected to do.”
He added, “We have a political class that is afraid to do something as simple as have a meaningful debate about our gun laws and how they are being enforced. We have representatives who look at gun violence, not as a problem to solve, but as the white elephant in the room to ignore. As a nation we have repeatedly passed up the opportunity to address this issue. After Columbine; after Virginia Tech; after Tucson and after Aurora we have done nothing.”
Loughner, 24, was sentenced to life in prison.
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