Officials: Shots Fired Into Florida Republican Office by ‘Some Sick Person’

Several shots were fired into an unoccupied Florida Republican office at some point on Oct. 28 or Oct. 29, Volusia County officials said.

Four shots in all were fired at the Republican Party office in South Daytona. No one was injured in the incident, Capt. Mark Cheatham told local news station WESH.

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The front window of the office was broken and damage was done to the building’s drywall.

Tony Ledbetter, the county GOP chair, told NBC Miami the shooting took place sometimes between when staffers left the office in the afternoon on Oct. 28 and returned the next morning.

Cheatham told WESH the shooting is being investigated as vandalism. That could be changed if detectives find another motive in the case.

Ledbetter said it appeared to be a drive-by shooting. A suspect hasn’t been identified.

“You’ve got some sick person, and I’ll call them out, they’re Democrats. No Republican’s got any reason to come attack our location,” said Ledbetter to local station WFTV.

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Photos taken from the scene show a bullet hole through a President Donald Trump sign hanging in the window.

The office is inside a strip mall in South Daytona.

Political Violence

The shooting follows acts of alleged politically motivated violence in recent days.

Cesar Sayoc, 56, of Florida, was charged with sending at least a dozen suspicious packages containing bomb-like devices to Democratic figures, including former President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and others.

But Republicans have also been targeted with acts of violence. A vandal in Bakersfield, California, threw a boulder through House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s office on Oct. 22. In recent months, a number of other GOP offices have been vandalized.

Trump last week condemned political violence and called for the “politics of personal destruction” at a rally in North Carolina.

“These terrorist actions must be prosecuted and punished to the fullest extent of the law, we all know that,” Trump said of Sayoc’s capture, congratulating the law enforcement for an “incredible job.”

“Political violence must never ever be allowed in America and I will do everything in my power to stop it,” Trump said.

Trump stressed that the media has a part to play.

“The media’s constant unfair coverage, deep hostility, and negative attacks ... only serve to drive people apart and to undermine healthy debate,” he said.

“We have seen an effort by the media in recent hours to use the sinister actions of one individual to score political points against me and the Republican party,” he said of the bomb scare. “Yet when a Bernie Sanders supporter tried to murder congressional Republicans and severely wounded a great man named Steve Scalise and others, we did not use that heinous attempt at mass murder for political gain because that would have been wrong.”