Rittenhouse’s Lawyer Slams ‘Disgusting’ Internship Offers From GOP Congressmen: ‘Trying to Profit on This’
Photo by Sean Krajacic-Pool/Getty Images.
Kyle Rittenhouse’s defense attorney criticized Republicans offering his client internships, calling it “disgusting” that people are “trying to profit on this.”
In an interview with Insider, attorney Mark Richards said, “There’s a lot of people trying to profit on this, and I don’t think people should.”
Richards’ comments follow Rittenhouse being acquitted of all charges stemming from his shooting of three men — two fatally — during protests in Kenosha over the police shooting of Jacob Blake.
Republican lawmakers jumped to publicly offer Rittenhouse internships.
During a Wednesday interview with Newsmax, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) said he was hoping for a not guilty verdict because “Kyle Rittenhouse would probably make a pretty good congressional intern.”
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) tweeted that he would “arm wrestle” Gaetz “to get dibs for Kyle as an intern.”
And Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) posted an Instagram story praising the verdict, with a caption that read, “Kyle, if you want an internship, reach out to me.”
To Richards, the offers are all examples of people attempting to “trade on his celebrity.”
“They’re raising money on it and you have all these Republican congressmen saying come work for me,” Richards said. “They want to trade on his celebrity and I think it’s disgusting.”
Richards also slammed Donald Trump Jr. for encouraging people to support Gun Owners of America, a gun rights organization that said it would “award” an AR-15 to Rittenhouse.
“He’s an idiot,” Richards said. “I don’t have to expand on that because it speaks for itself.”
The defense lawyer told CNN hours after the verdict that “there’s too many guns in our society,” later adding, “I wish our society wasn’t perceived as being so dangerous that people needed to arm themselves.”
