CNN This Morning's group chat offered a number of excuses for the Afghan immigrant's shooting of National Guardsmen.
CNN military analyst Cedric Leighton began by claiming that anyone can be radicalized, pointing to Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber! If ours is a country of 350 million potential mass murderers, all the more reason not to add to the count by admitting millions of lightly-vetted foreigners!
Leighton went on to say that the Afghan's struggles to make ends meet after coming to US might have set him off. Seriously? Perhaps he should have stayed in Afghanistan, that land of plenty!
Meghan Hays, a CNN commentator and former Biden aide, claimed that the fact that the Afghan shot at point-blank range proved that he was a "crazy person' with "mental illness."
Seventy-two virgins ring a bell, Meghan? Are all the "martyrs" insane?
Host Audie Cornish cautioned Hays on her insanity claim, saying we need to learn more. But Cornish continued:
"I will say that as US uniforms are a symbol, and as that symbol becomes controversial because of the way that they're used, we can create situations that we're all nervous about."
So, Audie, if poor Rahmanullah was triggered by seeing the Guardsmen in uniform, should the National Guardsmen perhaps dress in plain clothes to avoid upsetting the jihadis?
But wait: that's not an option, either! Liberals denounce ICE agents for NOT being in uniform!
Bryan Lanza, a Republican strategist and senior adviser to Trump's 2024 campaign, offered a plausible suggestion: that the Afghan had been radicalized by the demonization of ICE and of law enforcement in general.
Cornish was quick to declare that she didn't "go down that road" with Lanza, before offering her theory that Lakanwal had somehow been set off by the sight of men in uniform.
Here's the transcript.
CNN This Morning
11/27/25
7:19 am ETCEDRIC LEIGHTON: Look at what happens to Americans. You know, you've got people like, let's take an extremist like Timothy McVeigh, for example. You have somebody who had been vetted, at least as far as joining the military, being able to join the military, and then he became an extremist. So extremism is something that really can permeate any group in society, including the military, including law enforcement.
And when you have a situation like the Afghans where, you're point is is absolutely valid, you know, they come in here. This is a completely different culture for them. And then all of a sudden, they're confronted by things. They have to find a job but they have to, you know, support their family. In many cases, you've had a situation where people have failed to make ends meet.
. . .
MEGHAN HAYS: Any person, as you said, can be radicalized. So how do you how do you stop a crazy person? That, that is here the problem. This person clearly had mental illness. So it doesn't matter how much --
CORNISH: We don't know that Meghan, so I don't think we should go too far, probably. But there's all kinds of reasons --
HAYS: I'm going to go out on a limb and say if you go and shoot people at point-blank range, there's something not right there.BRYAN LANZA: I'll go out on a limb and say the demonizing of ICE, the demonizing of law enforcement, probably led to the radicalization as well. It made somebody feel comfortable to do violence.
CORNISH: I won't follow you down that road, but I will say that as we, US uniforms are a symbol. And as that symbol becomes controversial because of the way that they're used, we can create situations that we're all nervous about.
