Beto O’Rourke is running very, very low on juice in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, so of course he had to lie at the debate Thursday night about the recent mass shooting in El Paso being inspired by President Trump.
Racism, hatred, and everything else bad that apparently never existed before Trump, was to blame for the shooting, O’Rourke said in his opener at the event. Perhaps at that moment ABC should have thrown up one of those cute fact-checking graphics TV news has grown so fond of. It could have said something like: “O’ROURKE: TRUMP TO BLAME FOR EL PASO (THERE’S NO PROOF HE WAS).”
The shooter last month was apparently preoccupied with “unchecked corporations” engaged in a “takeover” of the U.S. government, the automation of jobs, and also an internet conspiracy theory about a deliberate attempt to replace native-born white Americans with immigrants.
Those first two prongs were basically ignored by the national media and also Democrats such as O’Rourke.
The shooter also wrote in what was allegedly his “manifesto” that immigration and his other obsessions “predate Trump and his campaign for president.” He explicitly said that he blamed both Republicans and Democrats for mass immigration.
It doesn’t matter to O’Rourke. He’s drowning in this race, and he needs something to grab onto, even if it’s a vicious lie.
