Colorado: 5 Dead in LGBTQ+ Nightclub Shooting

Facts

• A gunman on Saturday night opened fire inside an LGBTQ+ club in Colorado Springs, CO killing five people and injuring 25. Club attendees subdued and detained the gunman until law enforcement arrived to take him into custody. After the arrest, the attacker was treated for his injuries.
• The 22-year-old gunman immediately began shooting after entering the venue, before he was stopped by two clubgoers. The patrons were described as "heroic" by Colorado Springs Police Chief Adrian Vasquez.
• The perpetrator, identified by law enforcement as Anderson Lee Aldrich, was said to have been carrying two firearms, one being a "long rifle." He was previously arrested in 2021 after his mother reported him for allegedly threatening her with a homemade bomb, but no explosives were found and no charges were pursued.
• One clubgoer said he heard four to five shots, but first thought the sounds were part of the music and continued dancing. When he "heard more shots and saw the flash from the muzzle of the gun," he ran to the dressing room "and locked the door and laid down on the floor.”
• Court records show Aldrich has been charged with five counts of murder and five counts of committing a bias-motivated crime causing bodily injury, which is the Colorado equivalent of a hate crime.
• The attack came on the eve of Transgender Day of Remembrance, in which trans people who lost their lives to anti-trans violence and hate are remembered. The victims of the attack remain unidentified, though the parents of Club Q employee Daniel Aston say their son was one of the dead.

Sources: PBS NewsHour, Daily Wire, Independent, Forbes, and CNN.

Narratives

• Democratic narrative, as provided by Business Insider. Republicans should be able to connect the dots between their dangerous rhetoric and targeted mass shootings. Donald Trump's anti-Latino rants came before the deadliest anti-Latino shooting in US history, and now, following the party's anti-LGBTQ+ campaign there has been a deadly shooting at a gay club. "Thoughts and prayers" aren't good enough and don't excuse the rhetoric that helps cause these events.
• Republican narrative, as provided by Daily Wire. When an LGBTQ+ community is targeted, hypocritical outcries from Democrats inevitably follow. Yet again, the party in charge of the country's most crime-ridden cities is unashamedly blaming Republicans for a shooting, yet they stay silent when dozens of people are murdered weekly in their own jurisdictions. They care about human lives when it's politically convenient but not when their own constituents are the victims.

Predictions