Hours before approximately 2,000 people gathered for “No Kings” rallies in Warren and Youngstown — and many more across Ohio and the United States did the same — a lone gunman dressed up like a police officer and murdered a Minnesota legislator and her husband.

In the immediate aftermath, reaction was swift and — in some cases — misguided. Partisan hacks on both sides of America’s deeply divided political spectrum couldn’t wait to blame it on their opponents.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz called the slaying of former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman “a politically motivated assassination.” Hortman’s husband, Mark, also was murdered in their Brooklyn Park home.

The alleged gunman, 57-year-old Vance Luther Boelter, also shot Minnesota state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, at their home in nearby Champlin. The Hoffmans were wounded 17 times between them, and Yvette Hoffman reportedly threw herself on their college-age daughter to save her life during Boelter’s rampage.

A husband and wife were murdered and another couple were wounded, but all that some observers could do was try to blame extremists on both sides. Conservatives pointed to the fact that Boelter was appointed to a Minnesota workforce development board by then-Gov. Mark Dayton in 2016 and later by Walz. Boelter served in that role until 2023.

But as details began to emerge, it turned out he had registered to vote as a Republican while living in Wisconsin in 2004. Some who knew Boelter described him as “deeply religious and conservative,” according to The Associated Press.

Does it really matter what the killer’s motivations were?

Did it matter that it was a left-leaning lunatic who shot up a baseball field as Republican lawmakers practiced for the annual bipartisan Congressional Baseball Game for Charity in 2017?

Did it matter that it was an apparent trans activist who turned guns on children and staff at a Nashville parochial school in 2023?

Only to the extent that we know there are deep problems among some people in America. Unhinged zealots like Vance Luther Boelter, James T. Hodgkinson and Audrey Hale apparently became so enraged by what they considered personal and political injustices that they chose to end the lives of innocent people.

These violent people and others like them — including the gunman who shot at Donald Trump in Butler, Pa., and the would-be gunman who stalked the presidential candidate while he played golf in Florida — cease to be political activists when they move from words to weapons.

At that point, no one should care what political nonsense was floating around in their heads. Once they considered taking up arms and acted on that urge, they became nothing more than violent psychopaths.

Conservative or liberal, Republican or Democrat, red or blue — it doesn’t matter. We’d like to think that the vast majority of us aren’t like those who would kill for their cause.

Most of us grew up in an America where political violence was something that happened far away from here. Or so we thought. But did we actually come of age in a country that was better than that?

Alexander Hamilton, Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield, William McKinley, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy might beg to differ. Teddy Roosevelt, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan could have been part of that first group of dead presidents and political figures, had their would-be assassins had truer aim.

Donald Trump came within an inch or two of being assassinated live on television. Corey Comperatore, an innocent man in the crowd behind Trump, threw himself atop his family to protect them and made the ultimate sacrifice. All of this killing — years ago and today — happens because some Americans simply can’t just agree to disagree and live their lives. Sometimes, we can’t even agree on who pulled the trigger or set off the bomb and why.

But again, the why is not important. It doesn’t matter what side they chose or what ideology they favor.

If they try to employ or condone violence as a righteous political tool, they part of the problem. They’re terrorists.

One last thing: Boelter might have considered himself a man of faith, but if he is guilty of the crimes he is alleged to have committed, he was nothing of the sort and no better than any other alleged murderer or terrorist.

You don’t have to be deeply religious to be a good person. But faith and political zealotry do not justify political violence.

Ed Puskas is editor of the Tribune Chronicle and The Vindicator. Reach him at 330-841-1786 or epuskas@tribtoday.com.