Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., has accused Republican leaders of enabling “white supremacy” after a gunman who espoused “Great Replacement” theory talking points embraced by some GOP members killed 10 people in a Buffalo supermarket on Saturday.

Police say an 18-year-old white gunman livestreamed his attack on a Tops store in Buffalo, killing 10 people and injuring three others. The suspect posted a so-called manifesto online detailing his plan to target a black community and discussing his white supremacist ideology. The suspect wrote that he was motivated by the “great replacement” theory stimulated by Republican lawmakers and Fox News hosts like Tucker Carlson, arguing that immigration is used to replace and diminish white influence.

Cheney, who served as the No. 3 Republican in the House before being ousted by her party for criticizing former President Donald Trump, called out GOP leaders for bolstering a conspiracy theory that inspired no only the Buffalo shooter, but also other mass shooters.

“House GOP leadership has enabled white nationalism, white supremacy and anti-Semitism,” Cheney wrote on Twitter. “History has taught us that what begins with words ends with much worse. @GOP leaders must step aside and reject these views and those who hold them.”

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., the only other Republican who sits alongside Cheney on the House Jan. 6 Committee, tweeted that his “replacement theory” is that “we need to replace” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and Reps. Elise Stefanik, RN.Y. ; Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga.; and Madison Cawthorn, RN.C., among others.

“The replacement theory they push/tolerate is to get people killed,” Kinzinger wrote.

The deputy of another tweet called out Stefanik again for pushing the “white replacement theory” when he was the No. 3 Republican in the House, a post from which Cheney was removed for “demanding the truth.”

RELATED: Buffalo shooting comes eight months after Rep. Elise Stefanik called ‘Great replacement’

Kinzinger linked to an article about Stefanik called out by his hometown newspaper about a “despicable” Facebook ad that he said echoed “Great Replacement” rhetoric. The ad showed images of migrants reflected in President Joe Biden’s sunglasses while accusing Democrats of planning a “permanent election insurgency”.

“In 2017, white supremacists marched through Charlottesville, Virginia, carrying torches and chanting, ‘You won’t replace us’ and ‘Jews won’t replace us.’ Decent Americans recoiled from the unmistakable echo of Nazi Germany,” the Times-Union editorial board wrote in September 2021. calls the “replacement theory”, adopted by conservatives. media personalities like Fox News’ Tucker Carlson. And it seeped into mainstream political discourse in the capital region, where Representative Elise Stefanik adapted this despicable tactic for campaign ads.

The op-ed added that Stefanik “isn’t so brazen about using the slogans themselves; instead, she expresses hatred in the fearmongering anti-immigrant rhetoric that has become standard fare of Donald Trump’s party.”

Stefanik made no mention of the role racism played in the shooting but used it condolence tweet to highlight that this is National Police Week and “we must thank and honor our law enforcement and first responders who are heroically dealing with skyrocketing violent crime.”

Stefanik’s adviser Alex deGrasse pushed back on criticism of her announcement.

“Any involvement or attempt to shift blame for the heinous shooting in Buffalo onto the congresswoman is a disgusting new low for the left, their Never Trump allies and the sycophant stenographers in the media,” deGrasse told the Washington Post. “The shooting was an evil act and the criminal should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Despite the sickening and false reports, [the] The congresswoman has never taken a racist position or made a racist statement.”

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Stefanik isn’t the only prominent Republican pushing the theory. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., last year accused the left of bringing in immigrants to “drown traditional and classic Americans with as many people as possible”.

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Scott Perry, R-Pa., told a committee hearing last year that many Americans think “we’re replacing Americans of national origin — ethnic Americans — for permanently transform the political landscape of this very nation.

Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., defended Carlson’s rants by making the same arguments, tweeting last fall that the Fox host was “CORRECT about replacement theory as he explains what is happening in America.”

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., posted a Facebook video in 2018 that claims Jews are orchestrating mass migration to replace white people in “the greatest genocide in human history.”

Lesser-known Trump allies like Arizona State Senator Wendy Rogers, who suggested the Buffalo shooting was faked, have also claimed that “we are replaced and invaded” by illegal immigrants, echoing similar rhetoric from Trump himself.

The ideology quickly seeped into the party’s electoral base. Nearly half of Republicans, and nearly a third of the country, believe that “there is a group of people in this country who are trying to replace native Americans with immigrants who agree with their political views. “, according to an Associated Press/NORC poll conducted in December. Respondents who watched right-wing networks like OAN, Newsmax and Fox News were much more likely to believe in the conspiracy theory, the survey found.

No mainstream figure has been linked to promoting conspiracy theory more than Carlson, who pushed the idea that Democrats and elites are trying to force demographic change through immigration in more than 400 episodes of his show. , according to an analysis by the New York Times.

While there’s no indication the Buffalo suspect eyed Carlson, some of his rhetoric may have come directly from the host’s scripts.

“Why do we say diversity is our greatest strength? Does anyone even ask why? It’s said like a mantra and repeated over and over again,” the suspect wrote in his manifesto.

The line is eerily similar to a talking point Carlson has repeatedly pushed.

“In what, precisely, is diversity our strength?” he questioned in a 2018 segment highlighted by The Times among many others. “Since you made it our new national motto, please be specific when explaining it.”

Salon’s Amanda Marcotte wrote on Sunday that the Buffalo shooting is unlikely to have any effect on the rhetoric of the host or her fans since the conspiracy theory has only grown in popularity from other shootings. inspired by the “great replacement” in an El Paso Walmart and a Pittsburgh Synagogue.

“We cannot legitimately hope that they will be punished by this latest wave of violence,” Marcotte wrote, “but we can make it clear that their hateful rhetoric helped trigger it.”

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