Blaming Democratic rhetoric for shooting, Maine Republicans join call for unity

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

69% : Tardy and Keim both argue it will amplify support for Trump, and Brewer said it is seemingly playing to his immediate benefit.
53% : "Minutes after Trump became the official Republican nominee, Josh Tardy, who is one of the two Maine representatives on the Republican National Committee, described the tone at the convention as one of high morale, optimism and hope.
41% : "I think everybody's coming into this convention with profound thankfulness that President Trump was not assassinated," Tardy said, "and empathy for the victims."On Saturday, a gunman shot at Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, injuring him and two others and killing an attendee.
36% : He added that Trump also "regularly endorsed violence on behalf of his supporters.
33% : "Republican critiques of rhetoric about Trump being a threat to democracy echo the recent stance taken by Golden, considered a moderate Democrat, who wrote in an op-ed earlier this month that he refuses "to participate in a campaign to scare voters with the idea that Trump will end our democratic system" -- a view that Democratic lawmakers and community leaders told Maine Morning Star minimizes threats to human rights and freedoms.
24% : He cited Biden's recent back peddling on a remark he made in a private call with donors days before the shooting that Trump should be put "in a bullseye."
23% : At the same time, Republicans in Maine and across the country are blaming President Joe Biden's re-election campaign and Democrats' characterizations of Trump for the recent shooting -- though the motivations of the shooter have not yet been determined.
20% : "Keim characterized doomsday rhetoric about Trump as overblown.
14% : "Trump's vice presidential pick, U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, who Trump announced on Monday, also took to X following the shooting to allege that Democratic messaging led to the violence.
9% : While Biden said he did not intentionally use violent rhetoric, he did not apologize or back down from his criticisms of Trump as a "threat to democracy.

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