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Connecticut legislator DebraLee Hovey, a six-term Republican state representative for the towns of Monroe and Newtown, had some candid, if ill-advised words for Gabrielle Giffords, who visited with victims of the Sandy Hook shooting on Friday. "Gabby Gifford [sic] stay out of my towns!!" Hovey wrote on her then-public Facebook, via mobile from Saint Pete Beach, Florida. "It was political," she elaborated in the comments, according to cringey screenshots obtained by the Hartford Courant. "The Lt Gov was there […] and ALL political types KNOW it is courteous to let sitting Reps known when another political [sic] is in their...

A national initiative aimed at curbing gun violence was launched by former US. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, on Tuesday -- the second anniversary of the shooting that killed six people and left her critically injured. A new campaign website, Americans For Responsible Solutions, promised to “launch a national dialogue and raise funds to counter influence of the gun lobby.” The couple last week visited Newtown, Conn., where a gunman opened fire in an elementary school, killing 20 children and six adults in December. They also met with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a gun control...

Former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and her husband Mark Kelly launched a website aimed at curbing gun violence Tuesday, the second anniversary of the mass shooting in Arizona that left her critically wounded. "Two years ago, a mentally ill young man shot me in the head, killed six of my constituents, and wounded 12 others," Giffords wrote on the website. "Since that terrible day, America has seen 11 more mass shootings -- but no response from Congress to prevent gun violence." The website, titled "Americans for Responsible Solutions", also features an opinion article that the couple penned, which was published by...

Former US Representative Gabrielle Giffords will visit Newtown, Conn., the site of last month's deadly shooting in which 20 first graders were killed. Giffords survived a mass shooting in her home state of Arizona two years ago... ... Giffords plans to attend a private event at a local home on Friday, Steven Jensen, spokesman for Lieutenant Governor Nancy Wyman, said in an email. The event will have no media access and Giffords' plans are still developing and may change

The husband of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords ripped the National Rifle Association (NRA) on Friday for a press conference that defied “common sense” and defended “extreme pro-gun positions.” “Gabby and I are extremely disappointed by the NRA's defiant and delayed response to the massacre of 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School,” Mark Kelly said in a statement. “The NRA could have chosen to be a voice for the vast majority of its own members who want common-sense, reasonable safeguards on deadly firearms, but instead it chose to defend extreme pro-gun positions that aren't even popular among...

The federal judge who sentenced former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' gunman is advocating a nationwide ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines to take the "mass out of mass shootings." "There is just no reason civilians need to own assault weapons and high-capacity magazines," Judge Larry Allan Burns wrote in Thursday's Los Angeles Times. Since Jared Lee Loughner killed six people and wounded Giffords with his 31-round magazine Glock pistol, there have been six deadlier mass shootings, Burns wrote. "But reasonable, good-faith debates have boundaries, and in the debate about guns, a high-capacity magazine has always seemed to me beyond them,"...

The Congressional District 2 showdown between Republican Martha McSally and Democrat Ron Barber has gone into overtime - and it could come down to instant replay. McSally holds a minuscule lead of less than two-tenths of a percentage point over Barber - a 400-vote difference in a race in which more 228,000 votes have been tabulated, with several days of additional vote counting to go. What remains are an estimated 70,000 votes in Pima County, about 27,000 of them provisional ballots that need to be verified and the rest early ballots that were dropped off at polling places or delivered...

Did anyone else hear Debbie Wasserman Schultz loudly say 'I' just before Giffords launched into her rousing Pledge of Allegiance last night?

http://m.newsbusters.org/blogs/pj-gladnick/2011/01/19/palm-beach-post-columnist-slams-parents-rep-giffords-doctor-supporting-&themeId=0&group=blogs&tag=lambiet%20parents%20giffords%20lemole%20rep&traditional=true&title=Palm%20Beach%20Post%20Columnist%20Slams%20Parents%20of%20Rep%20Giffords%20Doctor%20for%20Supporting%20Tea%20Party%20Candidates

The only good thing I got out of the DNC Convention. Politics aside, may God bless Gabrielle Giffords and her continued recovery.

The suspect in a shooting that left a U.S. congresswoman wounded pleaded guilty Tuesday to going on the rampage that killed six other people. The plea spares Jared Lee Loughner the death penalty in an attack that gained worldwide attention. The plea came soon after a federal judge had found that months of forcibly medicating Loughner to treat his schizophrenia had made the 23-year-old college dropout competent to understand the gravity of the charges against him and assist in his defense. At one point, Judge Larry A. Burns asked Loughner if he understood the charges against him and what the...

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) -- Jared Lee Loughner pleaded guilty Tuesday to going on a shooting rampage at a political gathering, killing six people and wounding his intended target, then-Congresswoman Gabriele Giffords, and 12 others. Loughner's plea spares him the death penalty and came soon after a federal judge found that months of forcibly medicating him to treat his schizophrenia had made the 23-year-old college dropout competent to understand the gravity of the charges and assist in his defense.

Jared Loughner, the young Tucson man accused of shooting Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and killing six people, is set to plead guilty Tuesday, an official familiar with the case said Saturday. A psychologist appointed by the court is expected to say at the hearing that he is competent to plead guilty, the official said. A previously scheduled status hearing has been changed to a change-of-plea hearing. In February, the psychologist said Mr. Loughner, a diagnosed schizophrenic, remained incompetent to stand trial. But she said at the time that the defendant was making progress toward competency, according to federal Judge Larry A....

TUCSON, AZ (CBS5/AP) - It's a race for Congress that the entire nation has been watching, and we now know who will fill Gabrielle Gifford's House seat. Ron Barber, who worked as Giffords' aid and was injured in the Tucson shooting, is the winner of the District 8 race. He has about 52 percent of the votes; 86 percent of precincts have turned in their results. This race determines who will be representing Tucson for the next six months in Washington, DC. Right now, Barber has more than a 7 percent lead over Jesse Kelly, who ran against Giffords in...

Voters in Arizona were set to select a replacement for former congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D) in a competitive special election on Tuesday, but late poll closings left the winner undetermined late Tuesday night.

The special election Tuesday to fill the House seat vacated by shooting victim Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is overshadowed by the memory of the tragedy, but the Republican has tried to make it about Obama's policies. Tucson, Ariz. In a closely-watched race, Arizona voters on Tuesday will choose a candidate to complete the remainder of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’s term in Congress nearly 18 months after a gunshot wound to the head, which forced her to resign in January. The names on the ballot will be Ron Barber as the Democrat and Jesse Kelly as the Republican. But perhaps the two more...

The race, which has been under way since April, is between Republican nominee Jesse Kelly, a former Marine who ran against Giffords in 2010, and Ron Barber, Giffords’ former district director. Barber himself was injured in the shooting outside the Safeway grocery store on Jan. 8, 2011. He was shot in the leg and the cheek. Giffords has not been very present in Barber’s campaign. She was featured on a mailer paid for by the Democratic Party of Arizona, and she will be campaigning for the candidate this weekend. However, regardless of Giffords level of involvement, the race was never...

— Updated at 12:46 pm ET with a statement from Jesse Kelly's campaign. See end of post. — A PAC supporting Jesse Kelly, a former Marine running to replace Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in a special election on Tuesday, is using an image Kelly's campaign has avoided thus far — the candidate holding a gun. Kelly, a Republican, ran against Giffords, a Democrat, in 2010. Giffords resigned in January, just over a year after a shooting spree left six dead and the congresswoman critically wounded. Kelly's opponent this time is former Giffords aide Ron Barber, who was shot twice during the...

When it comes to President Barack Obama and the special House election to succeed Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, there’s the personal and then there’s the political. The personal: Days after bullets pierced his thigh and cheek in the shooting rampage last year that nearly took Giffords’s life, Ron Barber was paid a special bedside visit by the president and first lady Michelle Obama. But as Barber seeks the seat of his onetime boss in a June 12 special election, the Democrat is loath to mention Obama’s name let alone tout any bond they formed in the dark days after the shooting...

Arizona special election candidate Ron Barber, who talked around a debate question about who he's supporting in the presidential race, released a statement clarifying that he's an Obama guy. Here's the statement from spokeswoman Jessica Schultz: Ron’s point last night was that the election on June 12 isn't about president Obama, or any other national figure--it's about who is going to do the best job fighting for middle class families in southern Arizona. While Ron does not agree with the President on everything, of course Ron has supported and will support President Obama in the election. His primary focus as...