Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) is facing major blowback after inviting a constituent accused of a brutal murder to lead the Pledge of Allegiance at a hearing of the House Judiciary Committee.
The Daily Beast reports that Gaetz and his staff are in damage control mode after letting Corey Beekman, a U.S. Army National Guard combat veteran, do the honors of leading the committee in the pledge even though he allegedly killed a Michigan man.
In 2019, Beekman allegedly shot and killed 33-year old Billy Buchanan inside a home in rural Mason County, Michigan, and was arrested by police after a lengthy standoff. He was later charged with murder, but his case still has not yet gone to trial, and he moved to Florida.
For Buchanan’s family, the pain of losing Billy has been compounded by the failure of his case to be resolved in court—and it was compounded even further by seeing his alleged killer appear in full military dress as an honored guest on Capitol Hill.
“It was like getting a dagger stuck in our heart again,” said Denita Buchanan, Billy’s mother.
Could it be that Gaetz’s office neglected to do a Google search and/or background check on Beekman before extending the invitation? Apparently so.
It appears Beekman was first connected with Gaetz when he reached out to his congressman’s office for assistance. Gaetz explained himself by arguing that when a veteran contacts his staff, “our first thoughts aren’t, ‘let’s run a background check’ or ‘I wonder if this person had any run-ins with the law that might make someone look bad.’”
So if Jeffrey Dahmer or Ted Bundy had been veterans, Gaetz would have let them lead the Pledge of Allegiance in a congressional hearing because he didn’t want to make them look bad?
Mason County Sheriff Kim Cole … “A simple Google search, I thought,” would have given Gaetz the necessary background on Beekman.
“I do understand that our federal elected officials are probably being pulled in a lot of different directions, and a lot of them don’t get good intelligence info for a variety of different situations going on,” Cole said. “That being said, in this particular case, I was disappointed with the decision that was made.”
Gaetz is already trying to make it seem as if his glaring mistake never actually happened, deleting a tweet in which he referred to Beekman as a hero, along with a YouTube video of the accused killer leading the pledge at the committee hearing. However. that video is still available on C-SPAN.
