National security

The Texas Shooting Shows That Domestic Violence Is A National Security Issue

It seems like the United States can barely go a full month without having to cope with a horrific act of mass violence committed at the hands of a man with access to a gun.

We obsess over the shooter’s race, his religion, whether he had mental illness. We wring our hands over our lax gun laws. Our lawmakers offer inane promises of “thoughts and prayers.” We think there is no fathomable way to predict or prevent the gun carnage like that in Sutherland Springs, Las Vegas, San Bernardino, Orlando, and well, the list goes on.

But there is one disturbing, yet under-reported pattern that is painfully clear when it comes to mass violence and terrorism: Domestic violence. Many of the men who commit mass public attacks were accused of abusing the women and children in their lives.

Investigators now say that 26-year-old Devin Patrick Kelley was involved in an ongoing “domestic situation” when he opened fire at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Tex., killing 26 and wounding 20 more. Apparently, he sent “threatening texts” to his mother-in-law, who was not at the church at the time but was a member.