Ohio lawmaker who blamed drag queens, marijuana for mass shootings is getting threats

A state representative from Ohio took to Facebook to lay blame for this weekend’s two mass shootings on the “breakdown of the traditional American family,” media reports say.

State Rep. Candice Keller, R-Middletown, posted a rant to Facebook on Sunday in response to the mass shooting in Dayton’s Oregon District in which ten were killed, including the gunman, and 27 were injured, WXIX reported.

Many users took screenshots of the post that has been shared widely on social media.

“After every mass shooting, the liberals start the blame game,” the post attributed to Keller reads. “Why not place the blame where it belongs?”

The post goes on to list transgender people, gay marriage and “drag queen advocates,” as responsible parties as well as video games, recreational marijuana use, open borders and Millennial snowflakes. The post lambastes state office holders for having “no interest” in learning about the 2nd Amendment and points a finger at Obama for contributing to the disrespectful treatment of law enforcement.

“Did I forget anybody?” the post reads. “The list is long. And the fury will continue.”

A reporter at the Dayton Daily News read Keller the post in full, to which Keller replied that “it sounded like part of her posting but couldn’t be she sure if it had been altered,” according to the publication.

However, Keller told the Cincinnati Enquirer that she had, indeed, written the post and that it remains on her page, though not visible to everyone, the newspaper reported.

Area lawmakers have decried her posts and called into question Keller’s fitness for office.

“She loves to fan the flames and play the role of victim here, not the nine people who were killed,” Butler County Democratic Party Chairman Brian Hester said, according to Dayton Daily News. “She is fundamentally unfit for office. She is an embarrassment to her party, to conservatives, to Butler County and to the state Legislature.”

Cincinnati City Councilman Chris Seelbach, the council’s first openly gay member, paraphrased her post, writing on Twitter that Keller says, “the shootings happened because of my marriage to Craig,” and asked his followers to “let her know what [they] think.”

Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones, also a Republican, has called for Keller’s resignation, stating that she “doesn’t represent the party,” the Journal-News reported.

“Those people aren’t even buried yet and she came out with these comments,” Jones said, according to the publication.

Keller said she’s been told not to leave her home due to threats following her comments, the newspaper reported.

Keller has a history of making inflammatory statements. She received backlash in 2017 for sharing a post on Facebook comparing Planned Parenthood to Nazis, WKRC reproted.

In 2018, she made derogatory remarks about teenage gun control advocates who survived the Parkland shooting, stating that they’d “soon be eating Doritos and playing video games,” according to Newsweek.

This story was originally published August 5, 2019 at 9:17 AM.