Anti-LGBTQ gunman kills 5 at Club Q in Colorado Springs. GOP had amplified grooming rhetoric

On November 19, 2022, Anderson Lee Aldrich opened fire at Club Q, a gay bar and nightclub in Colorado Springs, Colorado, killing five people and injuring 25 others. Aldrich's grandfather, Randy Voepel, was a California Republican state assemblyman who celebrated January 6 as the beginning of a "1776 moment." Police and prosecutors charged Aldrich with murder and hate crimes. In the weeks before the shooting, Republican politicians including Rep. Lauren Boebert and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene had been amplifying anti-LGBTQ "groomer" rhetoric. After the shooting, far-right accounts circulated "groomer" content and praised the shooter online. The Department of Homeland Security tracked a "significant rise in homophobic and transphobic posts" following the attack. Club Q owner Matthew Haynes told Congress: "These thoughts and prayers alone are not saving lives. They're not changing the rhetoric of hate."