Nashville congressman responds to radical trans group: Turning shooter into 'martyr' is 'beyond disturbing' - Tennessee congressman weighs in after transgender group called Nashville shooting 'dual tragedy'

[Norm Chomsky]

Tennessee Republican Rep. Andy Ogles sharply criticized a far-left
transgender group that he said is attempting to portray the Nashville school
shooter as a "martyr."

Following The Covenant School shooting that left three children and three
adults dead, the radical Trans Resistance Network issued a statement calling
it a dual tragedy for the victims and their families, along with the
transgender shooter, 28-year-old Audrey Hale.

"Any attempt to turn a mass murderer into a martyr is beyond disturbing,"
Ogles, who represents the community where the shooting happened, told Fox
News Digital. "The notion that someone would try to justify this atrocity
disgusts me to my core.

"March 27, 2023, was not a dual tragedy as this radical group wrote," Ogles
said. "It was a targeted attack on children attending a Christian school
perpetrated by a hate-filled domestic terrorist. There is no place for
accepting or justifying the actions of The Covenant School shooter."

Ogles' remarks come after the Trans Resistance Network broke its pledge of
not engaging publicly with the news media to release a statement arguing the
shootings amounted to two tragedies and that Hale had "no other effective
way to be seen."

"The first tragedy today is the loss of the three children and adults," the
group said in its message. "We extend our deepest sympathies and heartfelt
prayers to those families dealing with the loss of loved ones. There is
nothing we can offer that will comfort the hurt, or ease the sorrow. We will
mourn with you."

"The second and more complex tragedy is that Aiden [the shooter's preferred
name] or Aubrey Hale, who felt he had no effective way to be seen than to
lash out by taking the life of others, and by consequence, himself."

The group added it does "not claim to know the individual or have access to
their inner thoughts and feelings" but it does "know that life for
transgender people is very difficult, and made more difficult in the
preceding months by a virtual avalanche of anti-trans legislation, and
public callouts by Right Wing personalities and political figures for
nothing less than the genocidal eradication of trans people from society."

"Many transgender people deal with anxiety, depression, thoughts of suicide,
and PTSD from the near-constant drum beat of anti-trans hate, lack of
acceptance from family members and certain religious institutions, denial of
our existence, and calls for de-transition and forced conversion," the group
claimed.

It later added that "hate has consequences."

According to its website, TRN "is a collective of experienced organizers,
committed allies, and concerned groups who are coming together for the
long-term survival and well-being of gender diverse people in a more extreme
environment."

Nashville Police on Monday identified the six people killed in the shooting
as 9-year-olds Evelyn Dieckhaus, William Kinney and Hallie Scruggs and Mike
Hill, 61, Cynthia Peak, 61, and Katherine Koonce, 60.

Koonce was the head of the school, Peak was a substitute teacher and Hill
was a custodian.

Hale, a former student of The Covenant School, entered the premises Monday
with two "assault-type rifles" and a handgun and began firing, police said.

Hale used hand-drawn maps with detailed entry points that were found at her
Nashville home.

The shooter was killed by responding Metropolitan Nashville Police officers
Rex Engelbert and Michael Collazo.