Fox News host Laura Ingraham has been ridiculed for suggesting marijuana was behind America’s mass shootings, including in Uvalde.
Speaking on Tuesday night, the Fox News anchor said mass shootings were the fault of individuals having “a dysfunctional home life” where drugs put them “on a highway to hell.”
“Pot use, especially among teens, can trigger psychosis,” argued Ms Ingraham, “and increase the chance that the young person will develop violent behaviours”.
She then alluded to Uvalde gunman Salvador Ramos, who authorities have not suggested was positive for an illegal substance when he shot 19 children and two adults on 24 May.
Ms Ingraham, pointing to a Daily Mail article that claimed The New York Times removed a detail about the Uvalde gunman “smoking pot”, then alleged that “pro-marijuana bias” was behind the omission.
“Why is that?” Ms Ingraham asked. “Was it bad information or is that the pro-marijuana bias we’ve been accustomed to?”
She continued by saying that “Americans are hearing a lot about AR-15s and background checks, and they deserve to hear about this as well”.
As Mediaite reported on Wednesday however, Ms Ingraham referenced sources like Covid anti-vaxxer Alex Berenson and the Association of Mature American Citizens, a conservative organisation, during her segment.
“Are we just going to pretend that Joe [Biden] confiscating all the 9 millimetres or Beto [O’Rourke] running a gun buyback program is going to heal our youth,” Ms Ingraham continued.
“I would rather operate in the real world, and that world is a lot more complicated than the anti-Second Amendment, anti-gun activist would suggest.”
On social media, her remarks were widely mocked – including by former Republican National Committee hair Michael Steele.
“Umm, @IngrahamAngle ‘violence”? What kinda sh* you smoke’? Pass out, maybe. Hungry, absolutely. Happy, always. To quote Kat Williams ‘That’s the side effects: hungry, happy, sleepy. That’s it.’ Well researched my bag of chips.”
Another wrote in reference to the 1963 film about drugs, “Reefer Madness”: “Good lord, Laura Ingraham thinks Reefer Madness is to blame for gun violence. WTF kinda weed is SHE smoking?”
The Fox News anchor claimed last week that US President Joe Biden was attempting to “exploit the massacre of innocent little kids” to help his polling numbers after he called for Congress to introduce tougher gun control laws.
Those remarks were also criticised on social media.
