NBC’s Today may have had more accurate coverage than CBS Mornings on Tuesday in mentioning the Covenant School shooter was transgender, but they were still wholly part of the liberal media’s anti-Second Amendment mob. Co-host Hoda Kotb played a leading role and took up a torch of her own in the leftist mob’s smear campaign in painting Congressman Andy Ogles (R-TN) as somehow unsympathetic to the victims because he and his child posed with rifles during Christmas.
On top of that, Kotb lobbied Nashville Mayor John Cooper (D) to push Tennessee lawmakers to join Connecticut in offering massive restrictions and bans on certain firearms and kinds of ammunition as it’d turn around our country’s wave of mass shootings.
Kotb first asked Cooper what he knew about the victims and how the massacre unfolded before pivoting to gun control:
Mayor, you talked very directly about guns and gun violence. This shooter was armed with two assault weapons and a pistol. And you were saying that the leading cause of death for children is guns and gunfire. It’s not car accidents. And you call that unacceptable. And what struck me is at the very top of our broadcast, we said that so far, there have been 13 school shootings this year. That’s one per week. It almost makes you think that it is acceptable on some level.
A longtime mayor and brother of former Congressman Jim Cooper (D-TN), the mayor played along and lamented how, “[i]n Tennessee, guns are essentially ubiquitous.”
Kotb then invoked Ogles, insisting there’s “a photograph that is getting a lot of attention and it’s been circulating,” which is always a fancy way of saying it’s something the liberal media dredged up and decided to turn into a thing.
Citing Ogles as the congressman “who happens to represent the district in which the shooting happened,” she bemoaned that the “family Christmas card” has Ogles and his children “all holding big what appear to be some assault weapons.”
“And this is what the quote says, the very atmosphere of firearms anywhere in everywhere restrains evil interference, they deserve a place of honor with all that is good, and they’re surrounded by the Christmas tree, wondering if you receive that Christmas card or whether or not you did what you think of it,” she asked.
Cooper replied he’s “not on his Christmas card list, and I don’t think it’s appropriate and I think the whole country can look at it and shudder a little bit and realize how inappropriate it is.”
Cooper continued to pile on and tie Ogles for the shooting:
Guns lead to tragedies. And whatever your political feelings are, we should not be celebrating the cult of the gun. And we — country needs to pick itself up and say no to an assault weapons lobby that, again, is making it too available and too convenient and too first of mind for people to go out and commit terrible acts.
Unfortunately for her, such a story will live forever (whereas The Washington Post tried to delete their hot take).
Kotb closed the interview by fawning over the mass gun control in Connecticut as the direct cause the state has become a bastion of safety (click “expand):
KOTB: [E]veryone keeps saying, well, they don’t do anything of Washington. After Sandy Hook in 2012, Connecticut did something. They instituted universal background checks. They expanded the state’s assault weapons banned and they outlawed new high capacity magazines. And here’s what happened as a result of that. From 2014 to 2021, Connecticut saw a 41 percent reduction in homicides. In 2020, Connecticut had the sixth lowest gun death rate among all 50 states. There are some things that can be done. It sounds like if this is an example at the state level, is that something you could see happening in Tennessee?
COOPER: Well, I think it would be very challenging for Tennessee...[P]eople need to understand that common sense reforms, which are not really onerous on gun ownership does make a big difference. And gun safety and common sense regulations to kind of separate mental health challenges away from active gun ownership seem imperative...[A] few years ago, what’s happened is we’ve rolled back any common sense kind of understandings about how these assault weapons in particular, are managed...and you end up with disasters and tragedies[.]
NBC’s pathetic part in a narrative seeking to put the onus of a school shooting on a Republican and their choice of Christmas card was brought to you with the backing of advertisers such as Citi and Honda. Follow the links to see their contact information at the MRC’s Conservatives Fight Back page.
To see the relevant transcript from March 28, click “expand.”
NBC’s Today
March 28, 2023
7:08 a.m. Eastern[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: Nashville Mayor on School Shooting]
HODA KOTB: Mayor, you talked very directly about guns and gun violence. This shooter was armed with two assault weapons and a pistol. And you were saying that the leading cause of death for children is guns and gunfire. It’s not car accidents. And you call that unacceptable. And what struck me is at the very top of our broadcast, we said that so far, there have been 13 school shootings this year. That’s one per week. It almost makes you think that it is acceptable on some level.
MAYOR JOHN COOPER (D): Well, and it isn’t. And I think this is the frustration by every city in the country, how this could keep happening in this volume. In Tennessee, guns are essentially ubiquitous. And when guns and mental health issues come into contact with each other, you have big problems like we saw yesterday and what is our worst day, nationals had challenges before. We’ve had tornadoes and floods. But when schoolchildren are attacked in their school that that’s your worst day.
KOTB: There was a photograph that is getting a lot of attention and it’s been circulating. It’s a picture of Congressman Andy Ogles who happens to represent the district in which the shooting happened. It looks like a family Christmas card and in it the family is, I don’t know if you can see in that image, but they’re all holding big what appear to be some assault weapons. And this is what the quote says, the very atmosphere of firearms anywhere in everywhere restrains evil interference, they deserve a place of honor with all that is good, and they’re surrounded by the Christmas tree, wondering if you receive that Christmas card or whether or not you did what you think of it.
COOPER: Well, I’m not on his Christmas card list, and I don’t think it’s appropriate. And I think the whole country can look at it and shudder a little bit and realize how inappropriate it is. Guns lead to tragedies. And whatever your political feelings are, we should not be celebrating the cult of the gun. And we -- country needs to pick itself up and say no to an assault weapons lobby that, again, is making it too available and too convenient and too first of mind for people to go out and commit terrible acts.
KOTB: Mayor, you know, we’re just talking about that, like what can be done and everyone keeps saying, well, they don’t do anything of Washington. After Sandy Hook in 2012, Connecticut did something. They instituted universal background checks. They expanded the state’s assault weapons banned and they outlawed new high capacity magazines. And here’s what happened as a result of that. From 2014 to 2021, Connecticut saw a 41 percent reduction in homicides. In 2020, Connecticut had the sixth lowest gun death rate among all 50 states. There are some things that can be done. It sounds like if this is an example at the state level, is that something you could see happening in Tennessee?
COOPER: Well, I think it would be very challenging for Tennessee, but I think it needs to be brought up. And I think people need to understand that common sense reforms, which are not really onerous on gun ownership does make a big difference. And gun safety and common sense regulations to kind of separate mental health challenges away from active gun ownership seem imperative. This is not when we used to do this a few years ago, what’s happened is we’ve rolled back any common sense kind of understandings about how these assault weapons in particular, are managed in America and you end up with disasters and tragedies, and it’s not the diminishment of people’s rights. It’s how we live together in a society safely.
