Las Vegas shooters covered the bodies of two slain police officers with the Gadsden ?Don’t Tread on Me? flag, LVPD said on the evening of the June 8 tragedy.
According to the Las Vegas Review Journal, the man and woman conducting the ambush, whose names have not been released, draped the bodies of officers Alyn Beck, 41, and Igor Soldo, 31, with a cloth bearing the coiled snake image now used by the Tea Party movement.
After leaving the slain officers at the Cici’s Pizza location of the incident, the shooters then entered a nearby Wal-Mart, killing a third person. The couple, who are believed to be a married man and woman in their late 20s, then shot themselves inside the retail store, police said.
In a search of their apartment residence, LVPD said it found items that indicate the couple were white supremacists, including swastika-bearing paraphernalia. The shooters spoke often about conspiracy theories, neighbors say, and even talked about a plot to kill police officers.
One neighbor informed local media that the male shooter told of his in-support presence, organized by the Tea Party, at Cliven Bundy’s near-Las Vegas ranch while the rancher was in an armed stand-off with federal agents over use of government property. Bundy’s wife, Carol Bundy, told the Review Journal that there was no relation between her husband’s conflict with the government and the Las Vegas shooting.
Sunday’s tragedy?is just the latest of many incidents of violence correlated to the Tea Party movement. In very brief example:
- A 2009 Fort Lauderdale demonstration turned into a street riot when Tea Party members attacked immigration supporters;
- A young woman was knocked down and stomped by a Tea Party leader at an event for Sen. Rand Paul in 2010;
- Tea Party demonstrations against the Affordable Care Act in 2010 often featured signs bearing threats of violence and assassination;
- An attack on two protestors at a Tea Party event with Sen. Marco Rubio was captured on video in 2011;
- In 2012 Tea Partiers bearing razors raided and destroyed a labor supporters? tent in Michigan, injuring a reporter; and
- Assassination of Maine’s Sen. Susan Collins was suggested to members in a Tea Party teleconference in 2013.
Many high-ranking members of the Tea Party have association with anti-Semitic, racist organizations, as well, according to a study released by the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights, including the Ku Klux Klan, the Council of Conservative Citizens, and White Patriots.
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