Seattle Interim Police Chief Andre Sayles is catching fire from social media users over his choice of terms to describe the shooters in a trio of deadly incidents that went down over the long Labor Day weekend.
Like many other big cities under Democrat control, the once pristine jewel of the Northwest has a serious crime problem, and criminals tend to act out violently, often killing each other – and innocent people – with guns.
Three Seattle-area residents ended their holiday weekend with a trip to the morgue, and during a Monday news conference on the shootings, Sayles raised eyebrows when he referred to the killers as “trigger pullers,” which some critics suggest sugarcoats the violent offenders.
“Trigger pullers.”
Seattle’s police chief Andre Sayles is facing criticism for referring to shooting suspects in his city as “trigger pullers” while discussing gun violence and the deadly Labor Day weekend.
Some local commentators say the phrase downplays the seriousness of the… pic.twitter.com/hSEdUsooGC
— Fox News (@FoxNews) September 9, 2026
“We’re looking at ways to where we can identify individuals that are known, we call trigger pullers, in our community,” Sayles said. “Identifying them, making sure that we’re putting cases on those individuals, working with King County Prosecutor’s Office, to bring these individuals to justice, because the families that lost loved ones, throughout the year and years past, deserve justice.”
The shootings all took place in the vicinity of the city’s Belltown neighborhood, which left three dead and three more injured during a 24-hour period, with one of the deadly incidents occurring at around 1 a.m. on Sunday after a fight at a street takeover escalated, leaving a 20-year-old man dead and two more young men injured.
A 23-year-old woman was also left dead when a “trigger puller” fired several shots into a car, and a 17-year-old was killed after a fight went to an entirely new level.
X users ridiculed the term, which at best downplays the violence, and at worst, is yet another example of the left’s relentless war on the English language.
So in Seattle we aren’t calling them “shooters” anymore? Now they are “trigger pullers”? pic.twitter.com/fiYvVMYpQO
— Ari Hoffman (@thehoffather) September 7, 2026
Yes, let’s protect the criminals so we don’t hurt their feelings
— Luka Duka (@lucas561) September 10, 2026
Will they still use the term if it’s a white person of color doing it? Just curious is all
— Magnar Lutsvane (@MLutsvane) September 11, 2026
Shootings are surging. Seattle is worried about the vocabulary.
You cannot make this stuff up.
— Justin Barrows 📸 (@BarrowsJustin) September 9, 2026
This is how leftism works.
There’s no end goal. Moving the goal posts constantly with increasingly weird pedantic changes that no one asked for, IS the goal.
— Exifirer (@exifirer) September 10, 2026
When you hire unqualified retarded people, you can’t expect much more than that these people really seriously irrational, delusional seriously crazy people
— Protein Pert (@ProteinPert) September 10, 2026
Oh man, I was really worried that there would be gangbangers shooting and killing eachother with full-auto glocks.
Instead, there will be economically disadvantaged friend groups full of trigger pullers who drastically hinder the life expectancy of their compatriots with…
— Shlippi (@realshlippi) September 9, 2026
Nothing pulls your trigger like buzz words and double speak.
— OldSlayer🇺🇸🍻 (@OldSlayerUSA) September 10, 2026
However, the term is not without precedent, and as Fox News reports, it has been used by former FBI Director Christopher Wray.
“You all know what’s driving the violent crime in your states,” the ex-FBI boss said in 2022 remarks to the Association of State Criminal Investigative Agencies. “Whether it’s a community where a disproportionate amount of gun violence takes place or rival gangs wreaking havoc in a particular region or a handful of well-known trigger pullers who keep finding their way back to the streets, no matter how many times they’re arrested, at the FBI, we want to be your integral partner in the fight against violent crime.”
Orwell would be proud.
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