Liberal media outlets took pains to defend a career criminal who brutally murdered a Ukrainian immigrant on a train in Charlotte last month. The slaying of Ukrainian immigrant Iryna Zarutska, 23, at the hands of repeat offender Decarlos Brown Jr., 34, was thrust into the national spotlight after surveillance video showing the vicious attack was recently released. On CNN Monday, Van Jones said we ‘don’t know why that man did what he did,’ adding that ‘this man is hurting.’

Brown has a lengthy rap sheet and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. His sister provided to the Daily Mail a conversation she had with Brown in which he stated, ‘I don’t even know the lady.’ Jones accused right-wing figures like Charlie Kirk of ‘pure race mongering, hate mongering,’ for claiming that Brown targeted Zarutska because she was white. Video of the attack included audio of someone saying ‘got that white girl,’ though it’s unclear whether Brown uttered the words.

Jones acknowledged that ‘what happened to that young woman was horrible and it’s everybody’s nightmare,’ before centering the issue around mental health. ‘It’s about the fact that we don’t know how to deal with people who are hurting in the way this man was hurting,’ he said. ‘Hurt people hurt people.’

On Tuesday, CNN’s Abby Phillip questioned The National Review’s Caroline Downey after she said Brown ‘was let back onto our streets despite a really bad criminal record that suggests he should have been locked away for life because he was threatening the public.’ ‘I’m sorry, he should have been locked away for life for what now?’ Phillip asked. ‘Schizophrenia,’ Downey responded.

‘You actually said that,’ Keith Boykin, a former aide to Bill Clinton, interjected. ‘I can’t believe you actually said that. Somebody should be locked away in jail forever for schizophrenia. Did you really say that?’ Kat Abughazaleh, a Gen-Z progressive running for Congress in Illinois, chimed in: ‘You said he should be locked away for life for schizophrenia. That is what you said.’ Downey defended her statement, insisting that Brown should have been ‘ institutionalized.’

‘And if you’re saying he should not, you are saying that young women like you and me are basically just – we are lambs into the slaughter.’ Also on CNN, media reporter Brian Stelter argued that stabbing was being used as political fodder by ‘pro-Trump activists’ and members of ‘MAGA media’. ‘They picked up on this video from local news and ran with it,’ Stelter said on-air Monday, adding, ‘some of the comments around this story are baldly racist, stoking fear of African Americans because this man attacked a white woman.

The New York Times, after weeks of not reporting on the incident, covered it Monday with the headline ‘A Gruesome Murder in North Carolina Ignites a Firestorm on the Right.’ The Wall Street Journal devoted a small section of its Monday paper to the stabbing with the headline: ‘Woman’s Stabbing Death Becomes MAGA Talking Point.’

A Politico piece was similarly titled: ‘Ukrainian refugee killed in North Carolina gets dragged into political messaging war.’ Axios’s headline for a story about the killing read: ‘Stabbing video fuels MAGA’s crime message.’ All the publications failed to report on the incident prior to this week, leading to a rebuke from White House Press Secretary Karolina Leavitt on Tuesday.

‘Perhaps most shamefully of all, the majority of media – many outlets in this room – decided that her murder was not worth reporting on originally, because it does not fit a preferred narrative,’ she said. The attack unfolded on August 22, soon after Zarutska boarded a South End light rail train in Charlotte and sat in front of Brown.

Footage shows a visibly scared Zarutska cower in fear after the unprovoked attack, in which she was stabbed three times in her neck and hands with a pocket knife. On Tuesday, it was announced that Brown had been charged federally, which raises the possibility he could face the death penalty if convicted.