President Donald Trump broke his silence on the shooting of multiple Maryland journalists Friday afternoon in a speech celebrating the six-month anniversary of his tax cut legislation.
“Journalists, like all Americans, should be free from the fear of being violently attacked while doing their jobs,” Trump said in a poignant moment lamenting the loss of five Thursday.
The Capital Gazette newsroom suffered a mass shooting Thursday when an aggrieved gunman fired multiple shotgun blasts through their door. He has now been charged with five counts of first-degree murder.
The gunman had a storied history with the newspaper, with multiple failed attempts to sue it for defamation. The Capital Gazette wrote a story about the gunman’s continued harassment of a woman online and in-person, which eventually led to him losing his job for the federal government.
He wrote a series of threatening letters to the paper and engaged in other troubling behavior ahead of the shooting.