Ted Nugent Says Parkland Survivors ‘Have No Soul’
During last week's March for Our Lives, Ted Nugent tweeted, "Shame on the adult scammers manipulating ignorant children for their counterproductive dangerous politics." Yesterday (March 30), he expanded on those words, calling the survivors of the Feb. 14 killing at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., who have since led the national outcry for tighter gun control legislation, "mushy-brained" and their actions "soulless."
He made those comments (embedded below) while speaking to Joe Pagliarulo on Newsmax's The Joe Pags Show. "The lies from these poor, mushy-brained children who have been fed lies and parrot the lies," he said. "They are actually committing spiritual suicide because everything they recommend will cause more death and mayhem, guaranteed."
Pagliarulo played a clip of two of the students, Emma Gonzales and David Hogg, calling donations to politicians from the National Rifle Association "blood money" while appearing on CNN. Nugent, who sits on the NRA's board, defended the organization.
"The level of ignorance goes beyond stupidity," he continued. "We have no blood on our hands. No NRA member have ever been involved in any mass shootings at all. In fact the National Rifle Association is the lone organization that has taught firearm safety in schools, and for law enforcement, and for military, and for children's organizations and family organizations around the country for 100 years. So once again, this poor pathetic individual is a liar."
Nugent broadened his scope to what he considered to be responsible for the students' words: schools and the media.
“The dumbing down of America is manifested in the culture deprivation of our academia that have taught these kids the lies, media that have prodded and encouraged and provided these kids lies," he said. "I really feel sorry for them because it’s not only ignorant and dangerously stupid, but it’s soulless. To attack the good law-abiding families of America when well-known predictable murderers commit these horrors is deep in the category of soulless. These poor children, I’m afraid to say and it hurts me to say this, but the evidence is irrefutable: They have no soul.”
Last year, Nugent promised to tone down his choice of words after his wife complained. "At the tender age of 69, my wife has convinced me that I just can’t use those harsh terms," he said. "I’m going to take a deep breath and I am going to back it down. And if it gets fiery, if it gets hateful, I’m going away. I’m not going to engage in that kind of hateful rhetoric anymore."