Trump says he hopes nation will heal after Kirk assassination but claims ‘radical left’ an obstacle
President Trump, in a Saturday interview, said he hopes the nation heals after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, but blamed the “radical left” for being an obstacle in that healing.
“I’d like to see it [the nation] heal,” the president said in a brief telephone interview with NBC News. “But we’re dealing with a radical left group of lunatics, and they don’t play fair and they never did.”
Police said Tyler Robinson, a 22-year-old resident of Utah, is being investigated as the alleged gunman in the fatal shooting of the Turning Point USA founder.
Robinson had become “more political” before the shooting and mentioned during a dinner with family that Kirk would be visiting Utah, Gov. Spencer Cox (R) said at a Friday news conference. Cox also revealed that bullet casings uncovered as part of the investigation into Kirk’s assassination had several messages inscribed on them.
He is registered as an unaffiliated voter and does not appear to have a prior criminal record, according to the Associated Press.
Trump's comments on Saturday echoed those from days prior, where he has claimed the “radical left” for the “rhetoric that is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today.”
Others in the GOP pointed their finger to the left in the wake of Kirk's assassination.
On Friday, a group of Republicans in the House Freedom Caucus called for a select committee to investigate “the money, influence, and power behind the radical left’s assault on America and the rule of law” in the wake of the assassination of conservative powerhouse Kirk.
Meanwhile, some Democrats have suggested that Republicans are the ones who have promoted rhetoric that led to the shooting on the campus of Utah Valley University.
Others, including Cox, have asked Americans and politicians to turn down the temperature.
In Trump's Saturday interview with NBC News, he said: “We’ll see what happens. They [the left] don’t like what’s been happening. We’ve been winning very big.”
Trump, however, has blamed Democratic mega-donor George Soros for the political act of violence and said his administration would investigate the hedge fund investor on RICO charges following Kirk’s killing.
Soros founded the Open Society Foundations in 1993 to support human rights initiatives aimed at promoting democracy.
For his efforts, Trump told NBC Soros was a “bad guy” who deserved to be “put in jail.”
The Open Society Foundations responded to Trump’s late August comments suggesting Soros and his son were a part of the “radical left” in a late August post.
“The Open Society Foundations, founded by George Soros and chaired by Alex Soros, do not support or fund violent protests. Allegations to the contrary are false, and the threats against our founder and chair are outrageous. Our mission is to advance human rights, justice, and democratic principles in the United States and around the world,” the organization wrote in a statement on X.
“We stand for fundamental freedoms guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, including the rights to free speech and peaceful protest that are hallmarks of any vibrant democracy.”