A city firefighter refused to respond to the Jan. 8 shooting spree that left six people dead and 13 wounded, the Arizona Daily Star reported, citing city memos.
The firefighter, Mark Ekstrum, quit the force two days later as management was considering possible disciplinary action against him, the Daily Star reported.
Fire Capt. Ben Williams wrote in a memo that when Ekstrum told him he would not go on the call, “he mentioned something about ‘political bantering’ and he did not want to be part of it,” the newspaper reported.
It’s really not clear what the issue was. The firefighter later said he had voted for Giffords. The response team actually had to go to another fire station to pick up a replacement for the firefighter who refused to respond. Luckily this group was not in the first response team.