Kings of Leon’s Nathan Followill expresses anger and grief over Nashville shooting
By Dan Heching, CNN
Following Monday’s shooting at Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee, Kings of Leon drummer Nathan Followill, who lives in the community, is airing his outrage at yet another incident of gun violence against schoolchildren, this one close to home.
“A school shooting just happened near my sons (sic) school. Multiple children dead but let’s make sure that the gunman had his 2nd Amendment rights,” Followill tweeted, adding, “F**k you Bill Lee and f**k the NRA.”
Earlier on Monday, an armed shooter fatally shot three 9-year-old students and three adults at the private Christian elementary school in Nashville. The suspect was shot and killed by police, authorities said.
Later, Followill tweeted that he’s “normally not a political person on social media but this hit too close to home.” He added that he hopes those affected by the shooting “can heal from this unthinkable tragedy.”
Musician Mickey Guyton, who identifies herself as Nashville-based on Twitter, tweeted, “As a mother, I’m pissed the f**k off. Shame on every single politician ok with doing nothing as CHILDREN are getting assassinated on an everyday basis in a place that is supposed to be their safe haven.”
Christian music singer Lauren Daigle told her followers on her verified Instagram that she is postponing her planned concert in Nashville that was scheduled for Monday night, and instead will hold a community-wide vigil to “share in a time of prayer and worship to honor the victims and everyone in need.”
Country singer Jason Aldean re-shared a post on his verified Instagram account from his contemporary Tim Montana, which read in part, “PROTECT OUR SCHOOLS NOW.”
“My bank, grocery store and Wal-Mart have more security than most schools. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH,” Montana’s post read.
Aldean added his own comment, writing that he “couldn’t agree more.”
Aldean was performing on stage in 2017 at the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas, Nevada, when a shooter opened fire from a room at the Mandalay Bay Hotel and murdered 60 people, causing some 800 more people to be injured.
Monday’s school shooting in Nashville brings the total number of mass shootings across the United States in 2023 to 129, according to data from the Gun Violence Archive, which, like CNN, defines a mass shooting as one in which at least four people are shot, excluding the shooter.
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CNN’s Eric Levenson, Jennifer Henderson and Theresa Waldrop contributed to this story.
