RedState editor Erick Erickson took advantage of the deadly terror attack on satirical French newspaper Charlie Hebdo Wednesday to slam American gay activists he blamed for the dismissal of Atlanta’s fire chief.
“They believe that the views they want to silence are not worthy of ever being spoken…and so they must be punished, they must be vanquished, and everyone must know it’s going to happen to them as well,” Erickson said on his radio show, appearing to barrel toward a denunciation of the Paris attackers.
“And so they did the only thing they could do, the only thing they knew to do,” he continued. “They went to the mayor of Atlanta and demanded he fire the chief of the fire department for daring to mock them.”
Erickson was referring to Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed’s (D) announcement Tuesday that he had dismissed Chief Kevin Cochran, following a month-long suspension for comments the chief made in a 2013 book, “Who Told You That You Are Naked?”
Reed said that he fired Cochran in part because he believes the book, which describes homosexuality as a “perversion” like bestiality, may make the city vulnerable to discrimination complaints, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He stressed that he did not terminate Cochran over his religious beliefs.
Erickson disagreed, arguing Cochran was “fired for being a Christian.”
An openly gay City Council member, Alex Wan, had said in a statement that Cochran’s suspension came in the wake of complaints from employees that Cochran’s self-published book was being distributed within the fire department, according to USA Today.
Erickson disputed that account as well. He said that his anonymous “inside sources” at City Hall said Cochran didn’t pass his book around to anyone other than those who asked for it, including the mayor.
In a blog post also published Wednesday, Erickson made the comparison explicit. “The terrorists did what had to be done to publicly destroy and ruin the offender…and the terrorists won in Atlanta,” he wrote.
Listen to the segment of Erickson’s radio show below:
