Trent Humphries, one of the leaders of the Tucson Tea Party, tells New Times that comments he made to a British news outlet regarding the shooting rampage in Tucson were taken out of context.
The Guardian quoted him saying that, "The real case is that she
[Giffords] had no security whatsoever at this event. So if she lived
under a constant fear of being targeted, if she lived under this
constant fear of this rhetoric and hatred that was seething, why would
she attend an event in full view of the public with no security
whatsoever?"
While some took that to mean that Giffords should have had security -- he said he was actually trying to dispel the notion that there was a "pervasive climate of fear in Tucson."
"I told him that it didn't really exist," Humphries says in an e-mail to New Times. "The
fact that Gabrielle Giffords was holding announced gatherings without
any type of security shows that she, her staff, and Sheriff Dupnik
didn't really feel that she was threatened."
He also said that "no one is placing ANY blame whatsoever on Gabby or
her staff. No one could have imagined anything like this could ever
have happened in Tucson."
More from his e-mail:
"It sickens me that something like this happened to Gabrielle Giffords
or anyone else. I certainly don't want to place any blame on anyone
other than the shooter at this point in the investigation."
