Barack Obama lashed out at Donald Trump for inflaming political tensions in the wake of the shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
The former president didn’t mention Trump by name, but left little doubt who he was calling out while speaking at a Jefferson Educational Society event in Erie, Pennsylvania, on Tuesday.
“When I hear not just our current president, but his aides, who have a history of calling political opponents ‘vermin,’ enemies who need to be ‘targeted,’ that speaks to a broader problem that we have right now, and something that we’re going to have to grapple with—all of us,” Obama said, according to The New York Times.
Kirk, one of the most influential figures in the MAGA movement, was shot and killed while speaking at Utah Valley University on September 10. Since then, Trump and other Republicans have tried to pin the killing on “radical” left-wing ideology fueling violence in the country, despite a spate of violence targeting Democrats this year.
Obama, who has long been the target of conspiracy theories from Trump and Republicans, also blasted the president for refusing to unify the country after Kirk’s killing. Trump specifically told Fox News last week that he “couldn’t care less” about bringing the nation together after the Utah shooting.
Obama said that stance is a direct contrast to other leading GOP figures, who he argued would have sought to calm tensions in the wake of such a “horrific” incident.
“I think George W. Bush believed that,” Obama said. “I believe that people who I ran against—I know John McCain believed it. I know Mitt Romney believed it. What I’m describing is not a Democratic value or Republican value. It is an American value. And I think at moments like this, when tensions are high, then part of the job of the president is to pull people together.”
Obama also cited how he avoided pointing fingers in the wake of the 2015 mass shooting carried out by white supremacist Dylann Roof, who murdered nine people at a historic Black church in South Carolina.
“As president of the United States, my response was not: Who may have influenced this troubled young man to engage in that kind of violence? And now let me go after my political opponents and use that,” Obama said.
On Tuesday, officials charged 22-year-old Tyler Robinson with multiple offenses, including aggravated murder, in connection with Kirk’s shooting.
Authorities allege Robinson messaged his roommate, who they say is transgender, that he had “enough of [Kirk’s] hatred” while admitting to being responsible for the killing.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
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