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The Great Smoky Mountain Journal

Staff Reports

Posted: Sunday, January 21, 2018 11:24 AM

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Missouri Lawmaker Who Called For President Trump's Assassination Booted From Committees

Sorry might not cut it for the Missouri lawmaker who called for President Trump’s assassination.

Missouri Senate leaders announced Tuesday that Democratic state Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal has been stripped of her committee assignments, just two days after she tried to calm the controversy with a public apology.

Meanwhile, the state’s Republican lieutenant governor, Mike Parson, on Tuesday called for the Senate to go into special session to expel Chappelle-Nadal from the body.

“I do not make this request of you lightly, but you and I know it is the right course of action to take for the people of Missouri,” Parson wrote in a letter to members of the Missouri Senate.

Republican Senate President Pro Tem Ron Richard and Minority Leader Gina Walsh on Tuesday both rescinded the lawmaker’s nine committee assignments, with Richard saying in a brief statement: "I support the decision of Senate Minority Leader Gina Walsh to remove Sen. Chappelle-Nadal from all of her Senate committees. I am also removing her from all appointments under my authority."

The move reflects the erosion of support Chappelle-Nadal has seen ever since she posted on Facebook last week: "I hope Trump is assassinated!"

Chappelle-Nadal later deleted the statement. She then apologized at a press conference streamed live Sunday on the Facebook page of the Clayton Times, a St. Louis County newspaper.

“President Trump, I apologize to you and your family,” Chappelle-Nadal said at the Wellspring Church in Ferguson, Mo. “I also apologize to all the people in Missouri. And I also apologize to my colleagues in the Missouri legislature for the mistake that I made.”

She added, “I made a mistake. And I’m owning up to it.”

But Missouri's Republican governor and lieutenant governor already had said senators should oust her from office if she doesn't resign.

Expulsion from office would require a two-thirds vote.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.