No, the Buffalo Shooting Isn’t Tucker Carlson’s Fault

great replacement
Buffalo Police on scene at a Tops Friendly Market on May 14, 2022 in Buffalo, New York.(Photo by John Normile/Getty Images)

May 16, 2022

The mass-shooting that took place at Tops Friendly Market in a Buffalo, New York community May 14 was an unspeakable tragedy. The shooter’s motivation, as indicated by his manifesto, was certainly predicated upon a dangerous radicalism that harbored awful presuppositions about race and minorities, most notably what many have called “Great Replacement Theory.”

Any unprovoked act of violence against a person, or group of people, is wrong. It is especially wrong when these acts are motivated by racial or ethnic hatred, and that is precisely what occurred during this horrific massacre. The gunman, armed with what appears to be an AR-15, shot 13 people, killing 10 of them. Even more lives, the victims’ families and friends, have been adversely affected by this horrific scene of events, and the man responsible should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Unfortunately, many people on the left have used this massacre as a means for their own political opportunism. The common accusation as of now is that Tucker Carlson, one of the most popular right-wing news personalities on Fox News (and in general), is somehow to blame for this tragedy. 

More specifically, Tucker Carlson is being blamed by his alleged promulgation of Great Replacement Theory. Believers in this theory posit that nonwhite people are attempting to diminish the influence of white people, mainly by emigrating to traditionally white-dominated countries. They believe that this goal is further achieved by white people having lower birth rates than other racial and ethnic groups, which believers claim will eventually result in the ‘replacement’ of the white race. Many adherents to this conspiracy theory also claim that Jewish people are behind the plan of replacing white people, according to PBS News.   

(READ MORE: The ‘Great Replacement Theory’ is Not a Right Wing Conspiracy, it is a Democratic Strategy)

It is certainly true that Tucker Carlson has discussed what he believes to be a dangerous trend of allowing illegal immigrants to flood the southern border. Here is a quote from Carlson, in which one New York Times columnist claims to denote white supremacy:

“I know that the left and all the gatekeepers on Twitter become literally hysterical if you use the term ‘replacement,’ if you suggest that the Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate, the voters now casting ballots, with new people, more obedient voters, from the third world. But, they become hysterical because that’s what’s happening, actually. Let’s just say it: That’s true.”

In context, Tucker Carlson is not claiming that white people are being replaced, but rather that the American electorate, composed of American citizens of all races and ethnicities, is being diluted by the rapid importation of migrants by the current administration. Americans may have their opinions and disagreements on this claim, especially when concerning the notion that mass-amounts of illegal aliens are voting in elections, but it is at least indisputably true that the Biden administration has presided over a free-for-all at the southern border. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), has had more than 1 million encounters with migrants at the southern border so far in the year 2022.

Despite what many on the left may say, Carlson’s claims about the unprecedented waves of migrants flooding our southern border are predicated upon a valid concern, and aren’t immediately associated with absurd alt-right theories of white replacement simply by virtue of raising such a concern.

Here’s the second half of the quote that our Times columnist conveniently forgot to include in his column:

“If you change the population, you dilute the political power of the people who live there. So every time they import a new voter, I become disenfranchised as a current voter. So I don’t understand what we don’t understand cause, I mean, everyone wants to make a racial issue out of it. Oh, you know, the Great Replacement Theory? No, no, no. This is a voting right question. I have less political power because they are importing a brand new electorate. Why should I sit back and take that? The power that I have as an American guaranteed at birth is one man, one vote, and they are diluting it. No, they are not allowed to do it. Why are we putting up with this?” (Emphasis added).

Regardless of whether or not you agree with Carlson’s point of view, his concern regarding the mass-amounts of migrants flooding our southern border has nothing to do with race. His concern is entirely rooted in American citizens of all races and ethnicities having their voting power diluted by an unprecedented wave of migrants.

The New York City Council, for example, voted 33-14 to allow non-citizens to vote in municipal elections. While non-citizens still cannot vote in state or national elections, the move shows that diluting the electorate with non-citizens in an attempt to win over votes is a preferable policy goal for Democrats, especially since non-citizens disproportionately lean to the left. Concerns about our border being flooded with illegal aliens are perfectly valid, and most Americans agree. There are legitimate efforts by those on the left to dilute the voting power of the citizenry, as exemplified above. 

In addition to there being no evidence to suggest that the Buffalo shooter even watched Tucker Carlson or Fox News, the logic doesn’t seem to apply when the shoe is on the other foot. 

The gunman who targeted several congressional Republicans and wound up shooting Rep. Steve Scalise in 2017 erected Bernie Sanders campaign signs in his yard, and cited MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show as one of his favorite television programs, USA Today reported.

Should Rachel Maddow, a left-wing TV personality, be held in contempt the same way Tucker Carlson is? What would have been the reaction from the left, for instance, had conservatives reacted with the same outrage against Maddow that is currently being directed toward Carlson? Does Bernie Sanders also have blood on his hands as a result of such a horrific event?

The answer, of course, is a resounding no. The only person responsible for the attempted assasination of Steve Scalise is the gunman who committed the crime, and the only person responsible for the recent shooting in Buffalo is the gunman who made the decision to do what he did.

Unfortunately, I cannot say that I am surprised by such rhetoric. The left has a strong habit of using horrific tragedies for the sake of their own political aspirations. Rather than focus on the victims of these tragedies, mass-shootings always seem to be used as an opportunity to smear conservatives and to conflate our ideas and values with the deranged lunatics who commit these heinous crimes. Rolling Stone even recently ran an abysmal piece with the headline: The Buffalo Shooter Isn’t a ‘Lone Wolf.’ He’s a Mainstream Republican. One needn’t say much more on Rolling Stone’s horrific display of editorial malfeasance, given the full scope of its absurdity conveyed in this column’s headline alone.

It’s moments like these that explain the Democratic Party getting trounced in the generic congressional vote polls for the 2022 midterm elections. The left’s inability to facilitate meaningful conversations on policy, instead opting for divisive narratives predicated upon identity politics, will ultimately be their undoing.

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