Rep. Liz Cheney blames Republican leadership for ‘enabling’ Buffalo shooting

Responding to the deadly shooting by a white nationalist in Buffalo, New York, Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney (R) has placed all blame on Republican leadership.

“The House GOP leadership has enabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and anti-semitism,” Cheney tweeted Monday. “History has taught us that what begins with words ends in far worse. @GOP leaders must renounce and reject these views and those who hold them.”

Ten people were killed and three were injured after a gunman opened fire at a Buffalo grocery store on Saturday. The shooter, an 18-year-old named Payton Gendron, surrendered after the attack and has since been charged with first-degree murder. The mass shooting was one of many this weekend.

The FBI is investigating the attack as a racially motivated hate crime, and federal authorities are also considering a potential terrorism charge.

The suspected shooter is believed to have written a 180-page document detailing his white supremacist ideologies and his plan to attack a Black community. In it, he allegedly expressed his belief in the “replacement theory,” which claims non-white individuals are being brought into the U.S. and other Western countries to “replace” white voters.

The theory itself is not unpopular. According to an AP-NORC poll conducted in December, one in three U.S. adults believe an effort is underway to replace U.S.-born Americans with immigrants for electoral purposes.

Several Republican lawmakers have been accused of sharing these beliefs. Among them was New York Rep. Elise Stefanik, whose campaign committee ran a series of ads in Sept. 2021 accusing Democrats of allowing undocumented immigrants into the U.S. in an attempt to outnumber Republican voters, as The Washington Post reported. However, her office released a statement condemning such “sickening and false reporting.”

The statement read in part: “Congresswoman Stefanik has never advocated for any racist position or made a racist statement. She opposes mass amnesty for illegal immigrants and Joe Biden’s wide open border. Like the vast majority of Americans, she opposes giving illegal immigrants the right to vote which NY Democrats support and have made legal in New York City. She strongly supports legal immigration and is one of the national leaders credited with diversifying the Republican Party through candidate recruitment and messaging.”