Senator Chris Murphy Calls on GOP to Condemn White Nationalist "Great Replacement" Theory

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Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) has called on the Republican Party to condemn the white nationalist “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory in the aftermath of a mass shooting that took place at a Buffalo, New York supermarket over the weekend.

“You see this throughline from El Paso to Charleston to Buffalo in which white supremacists who feed off of this online conversation about the ‘replacement theory’, fed by mainstream conservative and Republican institutions, are turning their anger into mass violence,” Murphy said during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

He added: “And so this is a moment for my friends in the Republican Party, who more than occasionally endorse these hateful theories about replacement to stop it. To stop it, to stand down, to condemn this kind of talk, to stop suggesting that Muslims or immigrants or black people or Jews are a threat to society because every time that they say things like that on the Senate floor, every time they go on Fox News and repeat that lie, they are unfortunately feeding this river of racist ideology into the brains of people who are contemplating mass violence. I know that’s not the intention of my Republican colleagues, but they’ve just got to be really careful about the things that they say right now.”

Murphy’s remarks came a day after Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) had harsh words for Republican leadership, saying that her party enables “white nationalism” that led to the shooting.

“The House GOP leadership has enabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and anti-semitism. History has taught us that what begins with words ends in far worse. @GOP leaders must renounce and reject these views and those who hold them,” Cheney said in a post on Twitter.

The shooting occurred at a Tops Friendly Markets supermarket in Kingsley, an eastern neighborhood of Buffalo, New York. Ten people were killed, and three others were injured; eleven of the victims were African American. The shooter described himself as a white supremacist and voicing support for the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory.

The theory is a favorite in white nationalist circles. It states that non-white individuals are being brought into the United States and other Western countries to “replace” white voters and achieve political supremacy.

The shooter is reported to have written a 180-page manifesto released prior to the shooting, primarily concerning the topic of mass immigration. He was arraigned in a Buffalo court and entered a not guilty plea to multiple charges of first-degree murder.