On Saturday, commenting on the murder of Nykea Aldridge, the cousin of Chicago Bulls star Dwyane Wade, Donald Trump posted on Twitter:
Aldridge was killed while pushing a baby stroller.
Fierce backlash erupted after Trump’s tweet:
The backlash prompted him to tweet an hour and a half later:
On Sunday, Trump’s campaign manager Kellyasnne Conway appeared on Fox News Sunday with host Chris Wallace, who asked, “Do you think it’s right to have that kind of political response to a personal tragedy?”
Conway evaded, “I was pleased that his next tweet expressed his condolences to the Wade family about the death of his cousin … That horrifying example, of a woman who had just signed up her children for school pushing a baby stroller, that is a nonpartisan issue that should sicken us all.”
On CBS’s Face the Nation, Conway explained, “He tweeted his condolences to the family right after that, and I’d like everyone to know about both tweets … I think you have to look at both tweets where he expresses his condolences. He reminds everybody he’s been trying to make the case that the increase in random crime and senseless murders, the poverty, the joblessness, the homelessness in some of our major cities is unacceptable to all of us.”
On CNN’s State of the Union, VP nominee Mike Pence argued Trump “has a plainspoken way about him. And the tragedy of a mother pushing her child on the streets of Chicago being shot and killed, as Nykea Aldridge was, just breaks my heart.”
Trump had been already accused of politicizing tragedies earlier this year, after the Orlando massacre in which scores of homosexuals were slaughtered in a nightclub by a Muslim terrorist. Trump tweeted: