JD Vance told a crowd in Arizona that better security in classrooms, not gun control, is the solution to school shootings, with the Republican nominee for vice president calling massacres like the one in Georgia this week an unfortunate “fact of life.”
Speaking at a rally at Phoenix, Vance said, “I don’t like that this is a fact of life. But if you’re—if you are a psycho, you want to make headlines, you realize that our schools are soft targets. And we have got to bolster security at our schools… We’ve got to bolster security so if a psycho wants to walk through the front door and kill a bunch of children, they’re not able to.”
The Ohio senator’s remarks came a day after a 14-year-old gunman allegedly opened fire at Apalachee High School, killing two teachers and two students. The suspect, Colt Gray, was charged with four counts of felony murder and will be tried as an adult.
Later on Thursday, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said that Gray’s father, Colin Gray, had been arrested and charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second-degree murder, and eight counts of cruelty to children.