Some anti-Trump folks have come up with the proof-positive that Trump is a bigot, because he demanded the death penalty for the New York Islamic terrorist Sayfullo Saipov, but didn’t demand the death penalty for Las Vegas white-guy shooter Stephen Paddock.
Ironically, it might actually create a legal problem in obtaining the death penalty for Saipov that a president has made that demand so publicly.
Regardless, there’s a *good reason* for the difference in treatment, and it has nothing to do with bias.
Saipove is still alive, so he can be executed. Paddock was killed at the scene, so executing him again seems somewhat problematic.
GQ Magazine was so excited to make it’s bias claim, it put it in the headline (h/t Ethics Alarms):
And the, oops:
Here’s a Wall Street Journal reporter making the bias claim (via Daily Caller):
“He did not react this way when a white person shot dozens of people in Las Vegas–he did not come and say well we need an immediate policy change, we need to give this guy a death penalty,” Stokols said. “He did not call for this in Charlottesville when the criminal here did the exact same thing…driving a vehicle into a crowd.”
In the honorable mention category is Think Progress editor Elham Khatami, who was upset Trump wanted Saipove sent to Gitmo, but didn’t make the demand for Paddock:
Of course, there was a reason for that:
In other news, Hillary Clinton is still not president.
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