Megyn Kelly Accuses Gun Control Advocates Of Blocking Action On Mass Shootings: ‘You Have LOST’

In the wake of a mass shooting at a Texas shopping mall that killed 8 people Saturday, SiriusXM radio host and former Fox News personality Megyn Kelly accused advocates of gun control of standing in the way of progress that could cut the number of gun deaths in America. “You’ve failed to effect change,” Kelly said on Twitter. “Please face it. You can’t do it, thanks to the (Second Amendment). We’re all well aware you don’t like that fact, but fact it is. What next? Must we just stay here sad, concerned, lamenting? Could we possibly talk OTHER SOLUTIONS?”

While little was known about the shooter in the Texas incident, Kelly suggested that “mental health interventions” and a “greater willingness to lock people up,” along with the “fortification of soft targets” were issues deserving of attention instead of limiting access to guns and a possible assault weapons ban.

By suggesting mental illness is linked to mass shootings, Kelly was perpetuating a myth that’s been disproven in several scientific studies. The FBI, which studied the individuals responsible for 160 active shooter incidents between 2000 and 2013, noted the “erroneous inclination to assume that anyone who commits an active shooting must be de facto mentally ill,” and found that “only 25 percent of the active shooters…were known to have been diagnosed by a mental health professional with a mental illness of any kind prior to the offense.” That figure is roughly the same for Americans at large, with about 1 in 4 adults suffering from a diagnosable mental disorder in any given year.

Kelly’s comments infuriated gun control advocates, including Fred Guttenberg, whose daughter Jaime was killed in the mass shooting at her school in Parkland, Florida:

Others pointed out that the majority of Americans want further action on gun control, and they’re not the ones “ruining any chance at change.” They pointed to Republicans in Congress and state legislatures, who have not only resisted stricter gun control legislation, but have pushed to expand access to guns and to make it easier to carry guns in public places.

Joining in the Twitter pile-on was former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann, who called Kelly a “screeching fascist” in a blunt and gruesome message: