Conservative pundit and columnist Charles Krauthammer criticized President Barack Obama on Thursday night for politicizing the shooting at Umpqua Community College earlier that day because “the bodies are still warm” as the President spoke.
“I don’t doubt that the President’s statement was 100 percent sincere and 100 percent knee-jerk,” said Krauthammer on an appearance on Fox News’ “Special Report With Bret Baier.”
Krauthammer said Obama should not be calling for gun law reform because there are too many unanswered questions just hours after news of the shooting spread.
“He has no idea what the gun was, how it was obtained, who the person is and what the motive is,” Krauthammer said. “What does he do if it turns out it was a terrorist?”
“To make a pronouncement at this time, when — I hate to say it — the bodies are still warm and the wounded are now in surgery, I think is at least premature,” Krauthammer said.
Stephen Hayes, columnist for “The Weekly Standard,” agreed, and said he didn’t “doubt” the President’s passion about changing gun policy.
“We don’t know anything about the circumstances of the shooting. We don’t know anything about how the shooter obtained the weapon in question. We don’t know any of this and yet the president is using this occasion to urge us to change our gun laws. There were 50 shootings in Chicago over the weekend for the second straight weekend in a row. Why didn’t the President go out and make a statement then?”
Hayes then continued the right’s tradition of pushing the distraction meme, and said Obama was using the shooting to get out from “an avalanche” of bad news in the last 36 hours.
Watch his comments below:
