Original article. If that had been his daughter, would he have shot her?
By Cara Castronuova
Published June 24, 2022 at 8:00 am Comment
Micki Witthoeft, the mother Ashli Babbitt, called out Republican Congressman Markwayne Mullin for his controversial comments defending the Capitol police officer who killed her daughter.
*Please read her full statement below.
Mullin is running in a special election to the U.S. Senate to represent Oklahoma.
He is on the ballot in the special Republican primary on June 28, 2022.
In the midst of the Unselect Committee’s Misinformation Hearings that continue to plague America, Mullin came out in defense of Capitol Police Officer Michael Byrd. Byrd killed Witthoeft’s daughter Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed US Air Force veteran on January 6th in cold blood and without warning.
According to a Newsweek article, Mullin broke from Trump’s condemnation of the officer and said “I actually gave him (Byrd) a hug and said, ‘Sir, you did what you had to do.’”
Mullin spoke on C-Span for its January 6th “Views From the House” show where he firmly defended Byrd’s actions in choosing to shoot the petite woman point-blank as she was being lifted through a window.
“If you’re going to present your weapon in a manner and give commands and they still don’t listen and they still approach, you don’t have a choice,” Mullin said. “Either you have to, at that point, discharge your weapon in a manner of self-defense or that weapon’s going to be taken away from you.”
“I am disgusted by Mullin’s insensitive distortion of the facts surrounding my daughter’s death,” said Witthoeft. “Ashli was not a threat when she was shot and killed, nor was she given any warning by Byrd. I can think of many other ways that he could have dealt with my daughter besides shooting her point-blank.”
Babbitt’s mother continued:
“Congressman Mark Wayne Mullin co-authored H.R. 1085 with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a resolution commending the conduct of the Capitol Hill Police and the unnecessary murder of my unarmed daughter, who served our country with honor. She was a hero, Michael Byrd is not. Byrd has a bad track record as a cop. He left his loaded weapon in a public restroom and he has a prior excessive use of force issue. Clearly Mr. Mullin has it confused.
Mullins comments are a gross distortion of the facts and a slap in the face to my family. There is nothing more painful for a parent than the death of a child. Mullin’s claim that Byrd “did what he had to do” is categorically false. Ashli posed no physical threat to anyone that day and was shot and killed in cold blood. NO VERBAL COMMAND OR WARNING WAS GIVEN. Congressman Mullin is spreading false information to the media and distorting the facts surrounding my daughter’s death.
His defense of the man who killed her and his political grandstanding in an attempt to capitalize on her murder demonstrate the Congressman Markwayne Mullin has neither the judgement nor empathy to be a US Senator. The Republican Primary Voters of Oklahoma who vote next Tuesday are forewarned.”
“It is idiotic Representatives like these helped this cold blooded killer raise over $164,000 on GoFundMe for committing murder,” said Tina Ryan of Citizens Against Political Persecution.
Other Congressional Representatives like Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) publicly donated to Michael Byrd’s page and tweeted in support of Byrd. “A worthy cause, as this man has faced quite an onslaught of misinformation and extreme threats,” Kinzinger wrote on Twitter.
Kinzinger is the only other Republican to sit on the Unselect Misinformation Committee besides Liz Cheney (R-WY). (We exclusively reported Cheney and the rest of her cohorts on the Misinformation Committee intentionally edited out and around relevant graphic footage of Babbit’s death from their video presentation.)
“Cowards like these should not have a voice in our Congress,” said Ryan. “Literally throwing an unarmed female veteran under the bus. They make sure their personal security detail is funded (the Capitol Police) and call them heroes for killing a Trump supporter, but then vote to defund the police for the rest of us regular Americans. Hypocrites.”
US Rep. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) is running in the Republican primary of a special election for US Senate alongside 10 other GOP candidates. The winner will fill the remaining four years of the Senate seat held by retiring Senator Jim Inhofe (R-OK). Oklahoma’s congressional primary on Tuesday, June 28. The general election will take place on November 8.
“There are 10 other GOP candidates to vote for in the primary, Oklahoma,” said Ryan. “Please consider one of them before Mullin. He is completely out of touch with his base. You would be hard pressed to find a Republican in Oklahoma that thinks veteran Ashli Babbitt’s killing at the hands of Michael Byrd was justified. If he is so out of touch with this matter, then one must assume he is also out of touch with other issues that are important to his constituents.”
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