Guns Make All Ideologies Lethal
Utah’s governor calls for civility while blaming marginalized identities, ignoring the reality that political violence thrives on guns, not just ideas.
Setting the Stage
The arrest of a suspect in the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk has shaken national politics. A high-profile act of political violence at a college campus, carried out in an already overheated climate, has fueled calls for unity, restraint, and accountability.
But instead of consensus, the reactions split sharply. President Trump immediately blamed the “radical left” before investigators had identified a suspect, promising not just to bring the killer to justice but to pursue “the organizations that fund it and support it.” His advisers echoed the theme: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he would track military personnel who mocked Kirk’s death, and Representative Clay Higgins pledged to revoke licenses, schooling, and even driver’s licenses for anyone who “belittled” the killing. Trump renewed his attacks on George Soros, calling for racketeering charges without evidence, while adviser Stephen Miller cast the moment as a civilizational struggle against “everything that is warped, twisted and depraved.”
Governor Spencer Cox, by contrast, took the opposite tack in Utah. He urged Americans to “disagree better,” to lower the temperature and resist the temptation to return hate with hate. Yet even in his plea for civility, Cox emphasized that the accused shooter was estranged from conservative parents and involved with a partner transitioning genders—as though these details were central to explaining the crime. That framing mirrored a national pattern: blame marginalized identities, while leaving unexamined the conditions that make political violence inevitable.
What both responses miss is the simplest truth. Across America, ideology alone does not explain why political disagreements so often end in tragedy. The common denominator is guns. A grievance, a conspiracy theory, even a hateful worldview—none of these are automatically fatal. What makes them deadly in the United States is the easy access to firearms.
The Power at Play
This incident highlights a pattern that has long shaped American politics: when violence erupts, leaders search for explanations in individual pathology or marginal identities rather than systemic conditions. National figures are often quick to invoke absent fathers, troubled relationships, or gender nonconformity as explanatory shortcuts. These narratives are easier than confronting the harder truth—that our political system has tolerated a flood of firearms that turns every grievance into a potential tragedy.
By pointing to the suspect’s trans partner, Cox exemplified this reflex. Rather than cooling tensions, the framing stigmatizes an already marginalized group and implicitly suggests that gender transition itself was destabilizing. This isn’t disagreement at a lower temperature; it’s a form of scapegoating that aligns with broader conservative strategies to turn trans people into symbols of disorder.
Meanwhile, Trump’s response weaponized the tragedy in another way. His focus on blaming only the Left, while excusing right-wing radicals as “reducing crime,” underscored how partisan leaders selectively narrate violence to suit their agendas. Both approaches deflect from the systemic condition that can make all of it lethal: the ubiquity of guns. Political violence doesn’t require a disciplined movement or even a coherent worldview. It requires access to a trigger.
A Lens of Justice
When public officials highlight a suspect’s connection to a trans partner, they perpetuate a cycle of scapegoating that extends well beyond state borders. Transgender people nationwide already face high rates of violence, harassment, and political demonization. To imply that transition is relevant to explaining a murder not only reinforces stigma but puts more trans lives at risk.
This isn’t just rhetorical clumsiness; it’s a systemic failure of justice. When marginalized groups are treated as shorthand for instability or danger, the national conversation turns away from the actual mechanics of violence. Instead of asking how guns made this crime possible, we fixate on identity politics that further alienate already vulnerable communities.
Justice demands more than condemning violence in abstract terms. It requires naming the systems that make violence predictable. No other wealthy democracy experiences political violence at this frequency or scale. That’s not because Americans are uniquely ideological—it’s because we’ve armed our polarization.
Reframing the Debate
The Far Right wasted no time in painting this killing as proof that the Left is inherently violent. That narrative is dishonest. It sidesteps the reality that mainstream Democrats have condemned the shooting outright and emphasized lowering the temperature. The contrast could not be sharper: while Republicans like Trump and Kirk have built careers on inflammatory rhetoric—casting political opponents as enemies to be destroyed—Democrats in this moment are focusing on restraint and de-escalation.
That asymmetry matters. It is not both sides fueling the fire. But it is both sides who live under the same dangerous condition: a country awash in guns. Every grievance, whether inflamed by Trumpian vitriol or stoked by fringe online radicalization, is more likely to end in bloodshed simply because the weapons are so accessible.
So the issue is not that “both sides do violence.” The issue is that in America, any side—whether egged on by a demagogue or radicalized in isolation—has the means to turn ideology into murder. That’s what separates the United States from other democracies, not some inherent taste for conflict but our uniquely permissive relationship with firearms.
Building the Conversation
To keep this conversation national, citizens must reframe how they talk about political violence. The key is not partisan blame but systemic conditions.
Logical appeal: Guns are the common denominator. Other democracies have intense political disagreements but far less political violence—because they don’t arm every dispute.
Emotional appeal: Families in every state, red or blue, want their children safe from political crossfire. That’s not ideology, that’s humanity.
Ethical appeal: Democracy only functions when disagreement doesn’t carry a risk of being shot. Gun access undermines that democratic baseline.
When we pivot from “who’s to blame” to “what’s the mechanism,” the conversation opens space for common ground. Everyone benefits from a society where disagreements don’t escalate into gunfire.
The Counterpoint Trap
Bad-faith arguments will surface nationally, amplified by conservative media that’s more interested in amplifying grievances. Here’s how to anticipate them:
“Leftists are inherently violent.” → Projection
This is a dishonest attempt to paint the Left as uniquely dangerous while ignoring the far greater body of violence linked to right-wing extremism. It’s not a claim of balance; it’s a deflection.
Takeaway: Point out that Democrats have condemned the shooting, while influential members of the far right are calling for civil war. The real threat isn’t leftist mobs—it’s widespread gun access paired with rhetoric that raises the temperature.
“This proves free speech online is dangerous and we need more surveillance.” → Euphemistic Reframing
This shifts focus from guns to justifying authoritarian crackdowns.
Takeaway: Insist the problem isn’t speech—it’s weapons flowing unchecked.
“If you disagree with Kirk’s politics, you’re complicit in this violence.” → Kafka Trap
This tactic frames dissent as guilt by default.
Takeaway: Call it out directly—disagreement is democracy, violence is access to guns.
Deeper Dive
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment – A concise history of how America’s obsession with guns was built into its founding myths.
Carol Anderson, The Second – A devastating account of how gun rights were constructed to maintain racial hierarchies.
Everytown Research – Up-to-date data showing that gun access, not ideology, is the clearest predictor of political violence.
These resources help readers understand the issue as systemic, not partisan.
The Last Laugh
Governor Cox says we should “disagree better.” Fine. But what good is better disagreement if the country is awash in guns? Americans aren’t dying because we argue too much. We’re dying because we’ve made it nearly effortless for any argument to end in gunfire. If we really want to lower the national temperature, maybe we should start by clearing the table of weapons.