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‘We’re Not Gonna Fix It’: TN Republican Says Congress Can Do Nothing to Stop Gun Violence – Calls for Christian ‘Revival’

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U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) says there’s nothing the 535 elected officials in the House and Senate can do to reduce gun violence and gun deaths.

“We’re not gonna fix it,” Congressman Burchett said on the steps of the Capitol.

“I don’t see any role that we could do other than mess things up, honestly,” he said in response to Monday’s school mass shooting in Nashville, where three nine-year olds and three adults were shot to death by a shooter with two AR-15 style assault rifles and a handgun.

READ MORE: Tennessee Governor Slammed After ‘Praying’ for Nashville School Community Without Mentioning Mass Shooting

Instead of Congress enacting stricter gun laws, background checks, and a ban on assault weapons, Congressman Burchett said, “you’ve got to change people’s hearts,” as he called for a Christian revival.

“As a Christian, we talk about the church. I’ve said this many times, I think we really need a revival in this country.”

Monday’s shooting at the Covenant Presbyterian Elementary School was the 130th mass shooting this year in America, bringing the death toll from all gun violence across all causes to 9989, including 403 children 17 or younger, according to the Gun Violence Archive.

Congressman Burchett is a member of the far-right Republican Study Committee, which has strong ties to the National Rifle Association (NRA).

READ MORE: ‘Our Children Deserve Better’: First Lady Jill Biden Speaks Out After Six Die in Nashville School Mass Shooting

On Monday, Burchett released a statement saying, “Kelly and I are praying for everyone at The Covenant School, especially the families of the shooting victims. No one should have to go through that kind of horrific event or lose a loved one like that. I’m so thankful to those brave folks who brought down the shooter and took care of the students and their families.”

Earlier this month Rep. Burchett was one of 26 House Republicans on the Oversight Committee who refused to sign a simple two-sentence statement denouncing white supremacy.

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‘Chutzpah’: Biden Blasts Johnson ‘Taking Credit’ for $30 Million Project He Voted Against

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Speaking in Pueblo, Colorado to promote his highly-successful “Bidenomics” fiscal program, President Joe Biden on Wednesday blasted Speaker of the House Mike Johnson for “taking credit” for a major federally-funded infrastructure project despite having voted against the legislation that made it happen.

“All across America,” the editorial board of the Las Vegas Sun wrote in August, “the success of Bidenomics is well beyond debate.” They also quoted former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, who “wrote in an essay last month, Bidenomics ‘is turning out to be the most successful set of economic policies the United States has witnessed in a half-century.'”

President Biden traveled to Colorado and spoke to voters in the district represented by U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO).

“The company that Biden visited, CS Wind, is on the home turf of Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who has described the president’s climate policies as ‘a massive failure,'” The Associated Press reported.

READ MORE: How Mike Johnson Spent the Day Protecting Mike Johnson

“’Did you all know that you’re part of a massive failure?’ Biden said to the workers and local officials gathered for his speech as he touted hundreds of new jobs fueled by tax incentives for clean energy initiatives. ‘None of that sounds like a massive failure to me. How about you?'”

At one point, President Biden targeted Speaker Johnson and Florida Republican Vern Buchanan, one of the wealthiest members of Congress.

“The new Republican Speaker of the House, along with Republican Congressman Vern Buchanan just visited Sarasota, Florida yesterday to tour the construction of a new terminal at that airport. It’s going to create thousands of jobs over time. The project is funded with nearly $30 million from the bipartisan recession law. It’s going to generate more than $30 million for Florida, multiple times times over and guess what? Both the Speaker and the Congressman voted against the law. And spoke against the law. But now they’re down there taking credit for it being built.”

“As my mother would say, ‘God love ’em,'” the President continued. “As one of my friends back home would say, ‘that’s real chutzpah.'”

Watch the President below or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘How Fascists Act’: Trump Slammed for Demanding Biden Weaponize Government to Help Him

 

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Speaker Mike Johnson to Be Keynote Speaker at Hardline Christian Nationalist Lawmakers’ Gala

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Last week, Christian nationalist religious-right activist and former Arkansas state Sen. Jason Rapert announced that House Speaker Mike Johnson will be the keynote speaker at the upcoming National Association of Christian Lawmakers gala that is being held at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC on Dec. 5.

The National Association of Christian Lawmakers, as its name suggests, is a far-right Christian nationalist organization founded by Rapert in 2019 that seeks to spread its far-right “biblical worldview” across the nation and “take authority” over every level of government.


Rapert, who last week was appointed to the state library board by Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, is a hardline anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ activist who has declared that no Christian can ever vote for a Democrat because Democrats have “been enlisted to further the antichrist cult in our country.”

When the National Association of Christian Lawmakers held a meeting earlier this year, participants used it as an opportunity to discuss plans to strip public libraries of their funding, convince states to designate June as “Christian History Month,” and defend the practice of imposing “the death penalty for sodomy.”

 

This article was originally published by Right Wing Watch and is reprinted here by permission.

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‘How Fascists Act’: Trump Slammed for Demanding Biden Weaponize Government to Help Him

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Overnight, amid a flurry of social media posts, Donald Trump demanded President Joe Biden weaponize the federal government to “come down hard” on a news media outlet to benefit the indicted ex-president’s 2024 political campaign. While attacking the press is part of Trump’s regular tactics, this time he’s getting widely criticized for his thinly-veiled threat he will do what he’s demanding of Biden if he retakes the White House.

The First Amendment is clear, and numerous rulings have shown the federal government cannot censor or dictate how or what the free press reports. It can, and has, asked for coverage of a story, and can direct a news outlet’s attention to an issue, but it cannot stop the media from reporting on a presidential candidate.

And yet, that’s exactly what Donald Trump demanded President Joe Biden do.

“MSNBC (MSDNC) uses FREE government approved airwaves, and yet it is nothing but a 24 hour hit job on Donald J. Trump and the Republican Party for purposes of ELECTION INTERFERENCE,” Trump claimed very late Tuesday night. “Brian Roberts, its Chairman and CEO, is a slimeball who has been able to get away with these constant attacks for years. It is the world’s biggest political contribution to the Radical Left Democrats who, by the way, are destroying our Country.”

READ MORE: Pence Bombshell Resurfaces Old Questions About Grassley and January 6

“Our so-called ‘government’ should come down hard on them and make them pay for their illegal political activity. Much more to come, watch!” Trump wrote.

Critics immediate focused on the fact that MSNBC is a cable news outlet that does not use what Trump called the “free government approved airwaves” (which are not free, broadcasters pay licensing fees.)

Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter David Cay Johnston, who has written several books on Trump, called it “a perfect example of Donald’s appalling ignorance.”

Also pointing to Trump’s false claim of MSNBC using “free government approved airwaves,” former New York Times media reporter Bill Carter noted Trump’s “ignorance is worse than the puerile name-calling.”

“He’s ranting mindlessly,” Carter observed, noting Trump “has several cable nets that are full-time propaganda channels for him.”

But the larger concern expressed was not that Trump does not understand the difference between broadcast and cable TV, but that he does not understand the U.S. Constitution.

READ MORE: ‘Rap Sheets as Long as King Kong’s Arm’: Republican Shut Down Over Gun Violence Claim

“Thank goodness for the First Amendment, which gives the American people, the private sector and the free press the right to tell the former President to shove it,” wrote U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-CA). “If Trump is going to say or do stupid stuff, or authoritarian crazy stuff, the press has the right to expose it.”

Former Obama Administration senior advisor and campaign chief strategist David Axelrod wrote, “I think we owe it to Trump to take his words seriously. He would use the power of government to punish media outlets who do critical reporting about him. Where are those who speak reflexively about fidelity to the Constitution but apparently have not read it?”

Former CNN chief media correspondent Brian Stelter responded to Axelrod’s post, writing: “Slight revise: Trump repeatedly did use the power of government to punish media outlets, and he can’t wait to do it again.”

Politico White House Bureau Chief Jonathan Lemire, who is also an MSNBC host, wrote: “Trump again threatening to use the power of the government against media he believes is being critical of him: ‘More to come, watch!'”

Gen Z speaker, writer, podcaster, and organizer Victor Shi noted Trump is calling for “MSNBC — which does NOT use free government-approved airwaves — to be dismantled by the government. Joe Biden does not say this about Fox, because he values democracy. Trump does NOT.”

Shi, adding other Trump overnight posts to his commentary, observed: “So, over the span of one night, Donald Trump called for the government to shutdown MSNBC because they don’t cover him ‘favorably’ & called for Obamacare to be gutted AGAIN. This isn’t how leaders [in a] democracy behave. This is how fascists act—& we must be alarmed.”

READ MORE: Johnson Suggests Santos May Resign – Will Indicted Congressman Try to Burn the House Down First?
 

 

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