In the November election, Kelly Rittenhouse announced on August 1 that he would n’t cast his ballot for Donald Trump, the former president and 2024 Republican presidential candidate.
Rittenhouse said he would write in Ron Paul, who ran for president in 2008 and 2012 but is n’t running this election cycle, in a press release on Friday.
After shooting and injuring two people and injuring three others during violence in Kenosha, Wisconsin in August of this year, Rittenhouse’s title was thrown into the public consciousness. Regional prosecutors charged Rittenhouse, next 17 years old, with death, but his legal team argued he acted in self-defense, frequently retreating from intruders and just firing at them as they closed in on him.
After a November 2021 trial, a jury found Rittenhouse not guilty on three first-degree homicide counts, and two counts of first-degree reckless endangerment. Due to the vague language of the Wisconsin state law in question, local judge Bruce Schroeder dismissed Rittenhouse from the list of charges against him for unlawful possession of a gun as a minor.
Many pro-gun rights activists believe Rittenhouse’s conviction was a victory for the rights to keep and bear arms and the general right to self-defense. Since his acquittal, Rittenhouse has continued to engage in gun rights activism, speaking at numerous events supporting gun rights.
Rittenhouse met with and expresses his gratitude to the former president throughout the course of the trial, and Trump showed support for Rittenhouse throughout.
Still, Rittenhouse said he had decided to signal support for Paul over Trump this election cycle, as a matter of principle. Trump’s online support base criticized some of the comments made about the announcement.
” A lot of people are upset that I said, I’m going to be writing in Ron Paul for President”, Rittenhouse said in a video message on Friday, addressing the criticism.
The 21-year-old explained he could not support Trump over the former president’s record on a key voting issue, gun rights.
” Unfortunately, Donald Trump had bad advisors, making him bad on the Second Amendment, and that is my issue”, Rittenhouse said. ” I will not vote for you and write someone else if you ca n’t be completely uncompromised on the Second Amendment.”
In a follow-up, Rittenhouse shared a social media post listing specific criticisms of Trump’s gun rights record.
The post mentions that as president, Trump supported a policy that the U.S. Supreme Court overturned in June. Trump was also criticized in the post for supporting the expansion of a “flawed” database for background checks on gun purchases and other background check expansions.
Trump was also criticized for supporting the passage of” Red Flag” law, which allows courts to impose a person’s firearms on them after determining whether they pose a risk to themselves or others.
The post then accuses Trump of supporting legislation that would have allowed the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA ) to include an assault weapons ban in legislation passed by Congress.
” We must hold ALL politicians to the same standards”, Rittenhouse wrote.
Following the Republican National Convention’s adoption of a stripped-down policy platform this election cycle, which removed several passages supporting gun rights that had previously been present on previous platforms, Rittenhouse’s apparent rift with Trump also comes as a result.
This article was originally published by FreeBase News, and it is reprinted with permission.
