1. United States
2. Utah
3. Letter

I’m writing, exhausted by our gun violence epidemic. I’m also frightened and angered by some Republicans’ talk of civil war and retribution for Charlie Kirk’s murder. His assassination was awful and should be condemned. The school shooting in Colorado was also awful and should be condemned. But using hateful or inflammatory language right now is irresponsible and wrong. Every lawmaker should be asking themselves two questions: 1) how do we tone down the rhetoric so no one else gets hurt? And 2) how can we pass common sense gun laws so that American citizens can live without fear of being mown down by weapons of war? Anything else is exploiting this situation for political gain and making the problem worse. Also, I understand that Senate Republicans just blocked an effort by Senator Schumer to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files. Why? I am furious about this. Release the files!