‘Enough is enough’
Veep mourns Buffalo victim
The US is in the midst of an “epidemic of hate” and it’s time for all Americans to say “enough is enough,” Vice President Kamala Harris said Saturday at the funeral for the oldest victim gunned down in the Buffalo supermarket massacre.
“The pain that this family is feeling right now and the nine other families here in Buffalo, I cannot even begin to express our collective pain as a nation for what you are feeling in such an extreme way,” said Harris while addressing hundreds who attended the funeral of Ruth Whitfield, 86.
“To not only lose someone you love, but through an act of extreme violence and hate. And I do believe that our nation right now is experiencing an epidemic of hate.”
During her three-minute speech at Mt. Olive Baptist Church, Harris noted other recent mass shootings that have devastated other parts of the country, saying “enough is enough.”
“There’s a through line to what happened here in Buffalo, in Texas, in Atlanta, in Orlando, what happened at the synagogues,” she said, “and so this is a moment that requires all good people, all God-loving people, to stand up and say, ‘We will not stand for this.’ ”
Whitfield was among the 10 people fatally shot at Tops Friendly Markets on May 14. Three others were also wounded.
Pols present
The vice president and her husband, Douglas Emhoff, privately met with
Whitfield’s relatives before the service, and later sat next to them in the front row during the service. One image taken at the funeral shows the VP hugging Robin Harris, Whitfield’s daughter.
Other elected officials in attendance included Gov. Hochul, New York City Mayor Adams and state Attorney General Letitia James. Harris was not scheduled to speak at the funeral service, but did so after the civil rights leader Rev. Al Sharpton asked her to address the audience.
No other elected officials spoke during the funeral.
After the funeral, a motorcade carrying Harris stopped outside the nowshuttered supermarket.
While there, Harris and her husband laid a bouquet of white flowers at the edge of memorial honoring the massacre’s victims and prayed for several minutes.