Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert.Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty
A controversial Colorado lawmaker and outspoken gun ownership advocate faced her latest backlash this week when her campaign sent a fundraising email about the gun violence debate soon after a mass shooting in her home state.
The email from Rep. Lauren Boebert’s campaign reportedly appeared mere hours after the Boulder, Colorado, supermarket shooting that killed 10 people.
The email was delivered about two hours after Boebert, 34, sent her thoughts and prayers for the victims in a tweet and the message arrived while police were still at the scene, confirming information.
There was no reply to PEOPLE’s request for comment from Lauren Boebert for Congress, the group that sent the email on the conservative lawmaker’s behalf.
Critics — includingfamily members of gun violencevictims — immediately expressed disappointment and frustration. Some said the fundraising email was distasteful.
“People like you are directly responsible for MY friends, MY family & MY community being put in harms way,” one person wrote to Boebert, in response to her tweets Monday night.
Lauren Boebert.JASON CONNOLLY/AFP via Getty
Boebert wrote in one tweet that she was trying to “make sense of this senseless violence” after the shooting.
“Interesting that you of all people can’t make sense of this,” one user responded, sharing the message alongside a recent photo of Boebert sitting at her computer with a large rifle displayed on the wall behind her.
“Maybe sit this one out,” another user told the restaurant owner-turned-lawmaker. Boebertaccusedher Democratic colleagues of trying to “advance a political agenda” in the wake of Monday’s shooting.
“It’s an American issue,” Biden said.
Lauren Boebert.Joe Raedle/Getty
Boebert, who owns a gun-themed restaurant in Rifle, Colorado, was elected in November after a campaign that often saw her touting a fierce allegiance toDonald Trump, 74, and speaking out about the Second Amendment while proudly showing off a gun holstered to her body.
Boebert wascriticized for speaking approvingly ofthe QAnon conspiracy theory in the past and continued raising eyebrows after she was sworn into Congress in early January.
Days after the deadly pro-Trump riot at the U.S. Capitol, Boebert and some other GOP politicians like fellow freshman Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene wondered whether lawmakers should be able to carry guns in the building.
Boeberttried to defythe Capitol building’s metal detectors and complained about rules on carrying weapons inside Congress before she waseventually granted a permitfor concealed carry.
source: people.com
