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Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said Sunday “just believing differently than some other American is not illegal” in the wake of conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s death.
“I’m a conservative Republican. I have Democratic friends that think very differently, vote very differently, but they’re still my friend on it. So, just having that ideology, just believing differently than some other American is not illegal, that’s America,” Lankford told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union.”
“We don’t all agree as next-door neighbors on different things, but it is very different to try to plan, strategize, to be able to carry out an act of violence on it,” he added.
Earlier this week, Kirk was speaking at an outdoor event at a university campus in Orem, Utah, when he was shot and killed. Following a manhunt featuring state, local and federal law enforcement, officials identified the alleged suspect as Tyler Robinson, 22, of Utah.
On Wednesday night, President Trump said he was “filled with grief and anger” at the fatal shooting of Kirk, and referred to Kirk as a “martyr for truth and freedom.”
Trump, by way of a Wednesday night video posted online, also pledged to “find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity and to other political violence.” He also put blame on the “radical left” for the “rhetoric that is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today.”
Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) said Thursday that Trump could display he’s “serious” about wanting to halt political violence by overturning pardons he issued for those convicted in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
“If the president is serious about stopping political violence, then maybe he should start by rescinding the pardons for all the domestic terrorists who came to the Capitol on Jan. 6 to kill cops, to kill Speaker Pelosi, to kill — to kill Vice President Pence,” Moulton said previously.
