Trump team scrambles after JD Vance calls school shootings ‘fact of life’

Donald Trump’s running mate JD Vance said in the wake of the deadly Georgia school shooting that mass shootings are unfortunately a “fact of life” and proposed ways to strengthen schools to make them safer from gun violence.

Kamala Harris issued a statement echoing Vance’s comments and called for “action to keep our children safe and keep guns out of the hands of criminals.”

And it seemed to strike a chord within the Trump team that she used Vance’s comments against them.

“Kamala’s interns just released a statement promoting FAKE NEWS,” Trump War Room posted on X with its over 2 million followers. “Watch the full video and you will clearly see that JD Vance is not saying what they claim he said. These morons do nothing but lie every day.”

Except Harris’ campaign shared the same video.

Here’s what Vance had to say:

“I don’t like that it’s a reality,” he said. “But if you’re a psychopath and you want to make headlines, you know our schools are easy targets. And we need to increase security in our schools. We need to increase security so that if a psychopath wants to walk through the front door and kill a bunch of kids, he can’t do it.”

Vance said he doesn’t like the idea of ​​his own children going to a school with heightened security, “but that’s increasingly the reality we live in.”

It’s all in what Harris’ campaign shared with running mate Tim Walz in a joint statement on the shooting. Vance said what Trump’s team said Vance didn’t say and accused Harris’ campaign of misrepresenting the facts.

The 14-year-old boy accused of shooting dead four people at his Georgia high school made his first court appearance Friday, a day after his father was also arrested for allowing his son to have a gun.

Colt Gray is accused of using a semi-automatic assault rifle to kill two students and two teachers at Apalachee High School in Winder, near Atlanta. Nine people were also injured in Wednesday’s attack. Authorities have not provided a motive or explained how Gray obtained the weapon or brought it into the school.

The teen’s father, Colin Gray, 54, was charged Thursday in connection with the shooting with counts including involuntary manslaughter and second-degree murder, Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Hosey said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.