*The son of an 86-year-old woman killed by the white supremacist gunman who opened fire in Buffalo, New York supermarket, delivered an emotional testimony, Tuesday during the Senate Judiciary Committee.
During the hearing, Garnell Whitfield Jr. spoke out against the “cancer of white supremacy” and America’s gun violence problem, Yahoo reports. Garnell’s mother, Ruth Whitfield, was one of the 10 Black victims who were targeted and killed in the racist attack on May 14.
As we reported earlier, gunman Payton Gendron was heavily armed and wearing body armor when he carried out the deadly attack. Gendron, a resident of Conklin, New York, was detained by authorities without incident.
READ MORE: Buffalo Mass Shooting Suspect (Peyton Gendron) Pleads NOT Guilty | VIDEO
Gendron traveled from his hometown, located 200 miles from Buffalo, to carry out the deadly attack. Eleven of the victims were Black and two were white, police say. Three people sustained non-life-threatening injuries during the shooting, per CNN.
Gendron wrote a 180-page manifesto about “replacement theory” … which is a narrative being pushed by racists that white people are being replaced and outnumbered by immigrants and people of color. He maintained a digital journal and said his exposure to the online message board 4Chan allowed him to interact with racist extremists which kept him motivated to stick to his plans to murder innocent Black people.
“My current beliefs started when I first started to use 4chan a few months after covid started,” Gendron wrote in the diary, as reported by New York Post. The publication obtained a copy of Gendron’s manifesto from the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation.
“Every time I think maybe I shouldn’t commit to an attack I spend 5 min [on] /pol/, then my motivation returns,” he wrote in another entry, referencing the message board racist and anti-semitic content.
“What are you doing? You were elected to protect us,” Whitfield Jr. told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“Is there nothing that you personally are willing to do to stop the cancer of white supremacy and the domestic terrorism it inspires?” he asked. “If there is nothing then, respectfully, senators … you should yield your positions of authority and influence to others that are willing to lead on this issue.”
Per Yahoo, “The hearing is the first of two this week as families of the victims and survivors of the mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde appear at public hearings and events on Capitol Hill to show the human toll of America’s gun violence and urge Congress to act,” the outlet writes.
The Senate hearing Tuesday focused on the white supremacist ideology.
“My mother’s life mattered,” Whitfield said. “Your actions here will tell us if and how much it mattered to you.”
Scroll up to watch his remarks via the YouTube clip above.
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