Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist and close ally of President Donald Trump, was shot and killed Wednesday at a Utah college event in what the state’s governor called a “political assassination.”

The Associated Press gathered reactions from several Democratic lawmakers.

“It shouldn’t matter what your political views are. You should be able to state in America whatever you feel,” said Rep. Joe Morelle of New York.

Rep. Debbie Dingell of Michigan shared a similar view. “All of us have got to work together and de-escalate the heat and the rhetoric in this country.”

“And remember, we’re Americans. You can disagree in a way that doesn’t end in the horrible way it did today,” Dingell added.

“Are we going to do something, or are we going to argue over rhetoric? That is my question. We have to pass gun safety legislation that stops this,” said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

Kirk’s killing is part of a troubling rise in political violence, from the assassination of a Democratic state lawmaker and her husband in Minnesota to last summer’s shooting of Trump, events that have roiled the nation.