United States | News & Politics

A 17-year-old Colorado boy was shot in the face Tuesday after he and a friend went to a home to ask permission to take homecoming photos on the property.

The shooting happened around 4:15 p.m. at a home on Pleasant Park Road in Jefferson County, the sheriff's office said.

When deputies arrived, the 17-year-old was "bleeding heavily from his face, as a second juvenile applied pressure to his friend's wounds with a t-shirt," the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office said in a news release Wednesday. The teen is recovering from his injuries.

Brent Metz, the boyfriend of a woman who lives at the home, was arrested in connection with the shooting.

He was booked on charges of first-degree assault, felony menacing, illegal discharge of a firearm, and reckless endangerment. It’s not clear if he has obtained an attorney.

The sheriff's office said the woman, who was not at the home, had called deputies before the shooting to report two trespassers on her property. She also called Metz, who drove over to the home and allegedly blocked the teen's car from leaving, according to NBC affiliate KUSA of Denver.

Metz then got out of his vehicle and allegedly fired one round through the windshield of the teen's car, the news station reported.

The 17-year-old told deputies that he and his friend went to the home because they wanted to take pictures there. He said they parked outside the gate, hopped the fence and walked up the driveway to look for the homeowner, the sheriff's office said in a news release.

When they could not find anyone at the residence, the boys "walked around the property trying to locate a homeowner" and then got back in their car, the sheriff's office said.

"They returned to their car and began writing a note to the homeowner, asking permission to use their property to take pictures," authorities said. "While they were doing this, a man they had never seen before pulled up next to them, exited the truck he was driving, and fired a round through the windshield, striking the 17-year-old driver in the face."

A sheriff's office spokesperson told KUSA that the teen's intent did not seem "malicious or criminal."

According to an arrest affidavit obtained by the news station, one of the teens said they heard Metz say, "Oh s---, my gun just went off," after the shooting. Metz tried to help the 17-year-old but his friend pushed him away, the affidavit says.

Metz, 38, is a council member for the town of Mountain View, according to KUSA. The town administrator declined to comment when contacted by NBC News on Thursday.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2024/03/28/brian-pritchard-georgia-illegal-voting/73135511007/

I haven't seen this discussed since the debate, and I'm curious what people think would happen.

(If you've seen this twice, I first posted it to a community that only allows links to news items, which rule I read only after creating the post. I removed that post)

The idea came from a post-debate discussion on NPR (National Public Radio), where one of the (professional) political commentators was asked if this was possible and they replied, briefly, that it would have to be done soon.

1. From the analyst's response, and what I can find online (e.g., here) it seems that it's not too late for Trump to make this change. Vance would have to voluntarily step down, but I can't imagine him defying Trump if he was told to beat it.
2. It's clear Trump isn't as enamored of Vance as he initially was.
3. I think even hard-core conservatives would agree that Vance hasn't helped Trump's campaign, and (as the commentator pointed out) he's gone off-piste from Trump's talking points at times.
4. Trump's core is voting for Trump; the running mate is a side show, and it's questionable how much Vance appeals to Trump's base. I believe Trump knows all of this, or at least believes it himself.
5. Trump prides himself on firing people when he doesn't like the way things are going, and it would be in keeping character for him to make Vance a scapegoat for the polling reversal and his losing the debate.

Therefore, I think this is not just a purely hypothetical question, but a very real possibility. Trump is chaos at the best of times, and this would be an unsurprising action. Regardless of advice he gets from his handlers, he'll do what he feels like.

So my questions are: first, who's the most likely choice for a swap; and second, how do you think it'd impact the election?

Sounds like it’s time for somebody to make /c/TrumpVsTrump