Two years ago today, an 18-year-old armed with an AR-15 style military assault rifle drove across New York to the Tops Market in east Buffalo to hunt down Black shoppers and kill them. By the time he was done, 10 people were dead. They ranged in age from 32 to 86, mothers and fathers, grandparents and daughters.
It was one of the most painful episodes of violence ever in this corner of the state, and it produced both notable heroes and notable cowards.
The truest hero that day was from right here in Lockport, Aaron Salter Jr., a former Buffalo Police lieutenant. Salter was the guard on duty that afternoon. He fired at the shooter with his handgun but was no match for a man with a weapon designed for the battlefield and military armor to match. Salter was a 55-year-old father of three and he sacrificed his life trying to protect others.
Another hero of that day, in a different way, was our congressman at the time, Chris Jacobs. A conservative Republican, Jacobs was a longtime opponent of restrictions on guns. After the Tops killings, he announced he would support a federal ban on military assault weapons like the one used in Buffalo. He said, “I can’t in good conscience sit back and say I didn’t try to do something.”
Within hours, the National Rifle Association, other New York Republicans, and even Donald Trump denounced him for it and called for his political head. A week later he dropped his bid for reelection and his promising Congressional career came to an end. He said afterward, “Look, if you’re not going to take a stand on something like this, I don’t know what you’re going to take a stand on.”
Which brings me to two profiles in cowardice from the shooting two years ago, two other local politicians, Congresswoman Claudia Tenney and State Sen. Robert Ortt.
After the killings, Tenney continued to make it clear that she is quite content to have us live in a nation awash in more than 20 million military assault rifles, and guns available to any adult with $700, just like the racist killer at Tops.
Tenney voted against the assault weapons legislation that cost Jacobs his political career. She was silent as her NRA friends crucified him. Tenney is a political extremist who seems to wake up every morning wondering what outrageous thing she can say to see her face on Fox News. After one mass killing Tenny said (based on nothing), “It’s interesting that so many of these people that commit the mass murders end up being Democrats.” As if the families of the dead care about the party registration of the murderers.
Tenney has never been accused of being a serious lawmaker. More disappointing is the lack of leadership on gun violence from Senator Ortt, who is actually an intelligent and reasonable legislator.
After the killings two years ago at Tops, Ortt released a brief statement saying that he and his wife were “praying for the victims and their families.” Then he did nothing. Senator Ortt is the highest-ranking Republican in New York state. As a veteran of Afghanistan, he knows quite well what a military assault weapon can do to a human body. He is in a position to help make real change, but won’t.
Both Tenney and Ortt make big speeches about their respect for police, but then refuse to actually give them the support they ask for.
A month after the Tops killings, the president of the national organization of city police chiefs told Congress, “We are out outgunned. We do believe that there should be a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines in order for us to properly serve and protect our community.” The response from both Tenney and Ortt was silence. Profiles in political cowardice.
Millions of responsible gun owners know what these two politicians evidently do not. Military assault weapons at home are not for hunting deer or frightening off intruders. They are for killing classrooms of school children and Black shoppers.
Two days after the Tops killings, members of Lockport’s Black community were gathered at city hall for a meeting on the My Brothers Keeper program. It quickly turned instead into an outpouring of fear, grief and anger over the shooting.
I was at that meeting and the thing I remember most was when a letter was read aloud from a Lockport High School classmate of Salter’s son. He wrote, “The government talks about terrorism. What about the terrorism in America? Another press conference isn’t enough and it’s getting old, something needs to be done. It’s 2022 and they’re still shooting us down like dogs in the street.”
Ten people were shot down at a supermarket by a young racist with a legally purchased gun of war. And politicians like Congresswoman Tenney and Senator Ortt can’t be bothered to do a darn thing to keep us any safer.