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"It is a tragedy for Arizona, and a tragedy for our entire country,"
President Barack Obama declared.
Giffords, 40, is a three-term moderate Democrat who narrowly won
re-election in November against a tea party candidate as conservatives
across the country sought to throw her from office over her support of
the health care law. Her office in Tucson was vandalized in
the hours after the House passed the overhaul last March as anger
over the law spread across the country.
Police say the shooter was in custody, and was identified by people
familiar with the investigation as Jared Loughner, 22. Officials said he
used a pistol with an extended clip to carry out the attack.
U.S. officials who provided his name to the AP spoke on condition of
anonymity because they were not authorized to release it publicly.
In one of several Youtube videos, which featured text against a dark
background, Loughner ... complained about the illiteracy rate among
people living in Giffords' congressional district in Arizona.
Giffords' Tucson office was vandalized a few hours after
the House voted to approve the health care law in March, with
someone either kicking or shooting out a glass door and window. More
recently, the sheriff also said that someone in a "very angry
audience" at a Giffords event dropped a weapon out
of their pants.
In an interview after the vandalism, Giffords referred
to the animosity against her by conservatives. Palin
listed Giffords' seat as one of the top "targets" in the midterm
elections because of the lawmakers' support for the health care law.
"For example, we're on Sarah Palin's targeted
list, but the thing is, that the way that she has it depicted
has the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district. When people do
that, they have to realize that there are consequences to that action,"
Giffords said in an interview with MSNBC.
The sheriff used the word "vitriol" several times to express his
disgust with the political climate in the country and in
Arizona, a heavily conservative state that put itself at the
center of the national debate on immigration last year with a
contentious crackdown on illegal immigrants. Residents and
politicians here have also vocally opposed Obama and Democrats on
health care.
A San Francisco man upset with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's
support of health care reform pleaded guilty to threatening
the Democratic congresswoman and her family ...
In July, a California man known for his anger over
left-leaning politics engaged in a shootout with highway
patrol officers after planning an attack on the ACLU
and another nonprofit group. The man said he wanted to "start
a revolution" by killing people at the ACLU and the Tides
Foundation.
During his campaign effort to unseat Giffords in November, Republican
challenger Jesse Kelly held fundraisers where he urged supporters to
help remove Giffords from office by joining him to shoot a fully loaded
M-16 rifle.
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