
"A list purportedly naming dozens of Democrats throughout history who have shot and killed presidents, politicians, and civilians has been circulating online since at least 2012 along with the argument that it should be illegal for Democrats to own guns. Musician Ted Nugent
posted one of the most popular iterations in September 2015 (see above.)
This list has evolved since it first started circulating in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012. The earliest
iteration of this list we could uncover only contained five items, but as it spread people added new names and dates and removed old ones that were either irrelevant or disproven.
The earliest versions of this list reveal two things: It has always been rife with errors (Lincoln’s alleged death-by-Democrat was originally
listed in 1863, not 1865), and has always circulated with an anti-Democrat, pro-NRA message.
This list is not comprehensive. It does not include all of the shootings that have occurred in the United States, nor the political affiliations of every shooter. It ignores shootings committed by Republicans, as well as those with no political party affiliation, and makes no attempt to show how political affiliation leads to violence. In other words, one could make a similar list naming nothing but Republican or politically unaffiliated shooters in order to make the opposing (and still flawed) argument that those groups should not own guns.
In addition to the logical problems of this meme, much of the information is also inaccurate.
We searched contemporary reports for each of the listed incidents in an attempt to uncover any mentions of political affiliations, motivations, or voting records. Many of these items can be traced back to poor reporting, articles that were later corrected, or fake news items. And although we encountered this meme (or a similar list) on a variety of web sites, none of these publications provided any documentation to back up these claims."
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