Seemingly itching for another anti-gun show trial like the one he “moderated” after the Parkland shooting (and won an award for), on Thursday, CNN’s Jake Tapper decided to target gun rights by once again exploiting an hours-old school shooting (Florida State University) for political gain. He trotted out 20-year-old Jayden D’Onofrio to be the voice to push for gun control with him. But while Tapper claimed his guest was just an average FSU student, D’Onofrio had a long history of being involved in Democratic Party politics and was even in the running to be the party’s vice chair in the state.
Tapper introduced his guest, saying: “Let's bring in Jayden D’Onofrio. He's a student at FSU. And, Jaden, we're so glad you're safe. Thank you so much for joining us.”
“We have a legislature here in Florida led by Republicans who have actively actually introduced a law this legislative session to lower the age to own rifles and guns in our state, which was a bill that they passed after the shooting at MSD in Parkland,” D’Onofrio cried to Tapper. “The shooter today was, I believe, 20 years old. It just doesn't make sense. It's nonsensical, Jake. It's nonsensical.”
D’Onofrio went on to suggest that the Republicans in the Florida legislature had blood on their hands:
I live two minutes from the capitol here in Tallahassee, and if I were to go speak to the legislators here specifically, I believe the Republican legislators who are passing these types of bills that allow this stuff to happen, they're going to give me thoughts and prayers, and I don't want to hear that because there's people dying actively, constantly from this – these kinds of shootings.
It's ridiculous that we continue to deal with this. They actually just – To take it back again. They just passed another bill to have the longest tax holiday in the entire state history to promote gun ownership in this state, and ammunition ownership. It's just it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. And it doesn't have to be this way. But we keep doing it. We keep going down this road.
“The adults of this country are failing the children of this country, and the young adults of this country like yourself,” Tapper responded. “And this didn't happen when I was your age. This wasn't something I had to fear when I was your age.”
Tapper would thank D’Onofrio for his “eloquence” at the conclusion of the interview.
If D’Onofrio’s (20) “eloquence” and extensive knowledge of guns laws and tax holidays making their way through the Florida legislature make you raise an eyebrow, it should. A NewsBusters investigation discovered that D’Onofrio was not the average FSA student Tapper had portrayed him as.
In fact, the reason D’Onofrio knew so much about the tax holiday was because he spoke out against it to Florida Senate’s Finance and Tax Committee just days ago.
“Today I spoke in front of the Florida Senate Finance and Tax Committee to voice my opposition to SB7034, a bill proposed by Republicans that will create the longest tax holiday in Florida’s history, for the purpose of purchasing guns of any kind and ammunition. This legislation will further promote gun violence and the deaths of innocent Floridians. Republicans are being weak on crime!” he wrote in a Facebook post.
In another Facebook post, D’Onofrio lashed out Congressman Byron Donalds (R) with profanity over the idea of him becoming governor. “Byron Donalds is just too f*cking extreme to become Florida’s next Governor,” he wrote. “Corrupt and shady politicians is not what Florida needs!”
And his reaction to the 2024 election results? “Devastated.”
His LinkedIn profile bragged that he was “Youngest PAC Chairman in Florida with Florida Future Leaders and was the inaugural Chairman of the Florida Democratic Party Youth Council.” As part of his work experience, he interned for three Democratic legislators in Florida at both the state and federal levels: State Senators Lauren Book and Shevrin Jones, and House Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. He was also a political fellow for Charlie Crist for Governor.
WFSU, the university’s NPR affiliate, bragged back in January that D’Onofrio had “made waves in the state Democratic party in recent years” as he was running to be a vice chair of the party at the state level. “His PAC, Florida Future Leaders, raised over a million dollars in 2024 to turn out the youth vote in Florida…D’Onofrio said he wants to bring those fundraising chops to the party, while prioritizing training local Democratic parties to utilize similar tactics to his PAC,” the station touted.
“Republicans have dominated our legislature for every year since 1996 and our governor's mansion for every year since 1999. It's gotten us to this point where we have one of the worst property insurance crisis in the entire country. We're also one of the most unaffordable states in the entire nation,” D’Onofrio told the station.
That doesn’t sound like an average FSU student. What it looks like is CNN trying to pass off a covert liberal activist on their viewers.
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read:
CNN’s The Lead
April 17, 2025
5:10:48 p.m. Eastern(…)
JAYDEN D’ONOFRIO: We have a legislature here in Florida led by Republicans who have actively actually introduced a law this legislative session to lower the age to own rifles and guns in our state, which was a bill that they passed after the shooting at MSD in Parkland. The shooter today was, I believe, 20 years old. It just doesn't make sense. It's nonsensical, Jake. It's nonsensical.
JAKE TAPPER: So just to get people up to speed when the Parkland shooting happened at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, in large part because of the efforts of students from that school and also just from all over Florida, there were gun laws changed, red flag laws passed, the age to own a handgun in the United States is 21. But in Florida, the age to own a rifle or a long gun was only 18. That was changed and made 21. And the governor at the time was Governor Rick Scott, currently a senator.
The effort after the shooting in Uvalde to make that national law failed, to make it 21 for long guns as well. And currently what our guest is referring to is there's an effort in Florida, as Jaden pointed out, to bring it back to 18 from the 21 that it had been raised to after Parkland.
And all that, for people who don't know, FSU and Tallahassee, all of that is going on in the same town FSU is located in the capital of Florida.
There are roughly Jaden there, roughly. 30 - 35,000 students at FSU undergraduate, plus an additional 10,000 or so graduate. This is going to affect all of you. I suspect. I don't know if you know anybody that has been directly impacted. I don't know if you know the shooter. But do you know anybody connected at all beyond the obvious connection of all of you being traumatized by this?
D’ONOFRIO: Yeah, I'm actually sitting here with a friend of mine who says they've actually seen the shooter before in class. This is a small community, and it's – This is not the way it should be. This, this – It's just not normal for this stuff to happen constantly, over and over and over again.
I live two minutes from the capitol here in Tallahassee, and if I were to go speak to the legislators here specifically, I believe the Republican legislators who are passing these types of bills that allow this stuff to happen, they're going to give me thoughts and prayers, and I don't want to hear that because there's people dying actively, constantly from this – these kinds of shootings.
It's ridiculous that we continue to deal with this. They actually just – To take it back again. They just passed another bill to have the longest tax holiday in the entire state history to promote gun ownership in this state, and ammunition ownership. It's just it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. And it doesn't have to be this way. But we keep doing it. We keep going down this road.
And it's I think all of us as students who, you know, see this constantly, but also, you know, knowing each other and being friends with all of each other and having such a community here, I think it's really up to us to kind of lead the way on this, because the legislators and specifically Republicans in this state are not helping us in any real way right now. And it's awful to see
TAPPER: Jayden. Let me just say, I have said it before on the show, and I'm sure I'll say it again. The adults of this country are failing the children of this country, and the young adults of this country like yourself. And this didn't happen when I was your age. This wasn't something I had to fear when I was your age. This is something that is a relatively new development in this country. And whether one wants to ascribe it to mental health crises or lax gun laws or a combination of the two, you have every right to feel outraged. And I thank you for your time and your eloquence today. Please take care of yourself.
D’ONOFRIO: Thank you. Jake, I appreciate you.
