ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

Rhode Island Republican Mike Chippendale Called Emma González A "Dummy" On Twitter

Photo: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images.
Another adult Republican lawmaker is hurling insults at one of the survivors of February's school shooting in Florida, because nothing says "public service" like calling a teenager names on the internet.
Emma González, a survivor of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting and gun reform advocate, tweeted on Sunday about the unarmed man who was able to wrestle an AR-15 out of the hands of a shooter at a Waffle House in Tennessee. The man killed four people before being disarmed by the heroic civilian. "The local police say a man at scene wrestled his gun away - looks like you don't need to arm a teacher (or a resource officer) to shop a shooting. There goes the sales pitch for @SmithWessonCorp," she tweeted.
AdvertisementADVERTISEMENT
Rep. Mike Chippendale, a Rhode Island Republican, took issue with González's tweet, responding with, "But if he DID have a gun - the police still wouldn't be searching for the gunman, and the entire region wouldn't be on lockdown...dummy." He has since deleted the tweet.
Chippendale, who was elected in 2010, is up for reelection and is currently running uncontested.
The lawmaker, who has an A+ rating from the NRA, is not the first Republican to mock González on Twitter. In March, a Maine Republican who was also running for office uncontested called González a "skinhead lesbian" on Twitter. He later dropped out of the race after a woman stepped up to challenge him.
Other Parkland student activists have been targets of Republican politicians and conservative pundits. Fox News host Laura Ingraham mocked David Hogg for not getting accepted into several colleges and Sinclair host Jamie Allman threatened to physically assault him with a "hot poker." Nick Isgro, another Republican from Maine, also told Hogg to "eat it" on Twitter.
Since launching the Never Again movement, the teen activists have not just been targets of petty insults, but of far-right conspiracy theories. Nevertheless, González and other activists have inspired a nationwide movement of young people for gun reform that shows no signs of slowing down.
Refinery29 has reached out to Rep. Chippendale for comment and will update this story when we hear back.
Read these stories next:

More from US News

ADVERTISEMENT