In a speech to the State Senate in July 2015, Thurmond called for the Confederate flag to be permanently removed from the grounds of the State House. The move was triggered by the shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church in Charleston which occurred a month earlier, in which nine people—including Thurmond's colleague Clementa Pinckney—were killed. The massacre was carried out by white supremacist Dylann Roof, who was a prominent exhibitionist of the flag.