A gun control nut vandalized the 9/11 Memorial Reflecting Pool with red spray paint in broad daylight in a political stunt.
Police said 31-year-old Jonathan Andrew Tijerina was arrested and charged with criminal mischief and graffiti after he tagged his website’s name on a portion of the North Tower’s reflecting pool on Monday night, police said, CBS News New York reported.
“Juststopkillingkids.com,” read red spray paint on a memorial bearing the names of dozens of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Tijerina, 31, took the blame for the despicable act of sacrilege on herself and released her own video.
Several videos posted on Instagram show the alleged vandal recording the stunt from start to finish, capturing himself walking to the monument, taking a spray can out of his bag and writing his message on several panels.
According to police, Tijerina claimed to be behind the vandalism, which caused more than $2,500 in damage.
“My name is Jon Tijerina and I just spray-painted ‘Stop Killing the Children’ on the 9/11 Memorial,” Tijerina boasted.
The 9/11 Memorial and Museum announced that the spray paint had been removed, returning the memorial to its original condition.
“The 9/11 Memorial is a sacred site of reflection in the heart of the rebuilt World Trade Center, commemorating the 2,983 victims who lost their lives in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and February 26, 1993. Security and law enforcement officials quickly handled the brief incident yesterday, and the affected area was immediately restored to a state of commemoration,” a New York spokesman said.
Tijerina’s website promotes “nonviolent civil resistance” as the answer to his campaign, saying it is a way to change law and society.
Tijerina promoted his arrest as a victory, trying to get the attention of President Trump and New York City Mayor Zoran Mamdani.
“On October 26, 2026, Jon Tijerina was arrested for spraying red paint on New York’s Freedom Tower. He asked Trump and Mamdani to implement common-sense, popular demands on guns, such as universal background checks and a national gun registry,” Tijerina’s group wrote in a follow-up post.
He cited the mass shooting following the Florida A&M University homecoming football game as the reason for his alleged vandalism.
The “Civil Resistance” group in Tijerina presented two demands to “stop killing children” – calling for universal background checks and universal gun registration.
“We have two specific, achievable demands. Both have the support of a majority of the public. Both already exist in other high-income countries. Neither requires repealing the Second Amendment. We are not asking for the impossible — we are asking for something that other wealthy democracies already have,” the website says.
Tijerina complained on Monday that another one of his political protests – a recent seven-day fast – had not received any attention.
What he called the week-long protest was to demand 2 million affordable homes in the city within five years.