SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) — The Latest on vandalism of a Confederate monument in Missouri (all times local):

7:15 p.m.

A Missouri lawmaker says in a Facebook post that he hopes whoever placed paint on a Confederate monument in Springfield is found and hanged.

Osceola Republican Rep. Warren Love said in a Facebook post Wednesday that he hopes whoever vandalized the monument is “hung from a tall tree with a long rope.”

He later told The Associated Press that he didn’t really mean that and says he thinks it’s terrible when someone vandalizes an object of remembrance. Love apologized in a later post he provided to AP.

The vandalism was discovered at the Springfield National Cemetery on Wednesday, at a time when heightened security surrounded President Donald Trump’s visit to Springfield.

Missouri Democratic Party Chairman Stephen Webber is calling on Love to resign.

Love’s post is no longer up, although the lawmaker told AP he did not take it down.

____

2:15 p.m.

Crews in the southeast Missouri city of Springfield are cleaning up after paint was placed on a Confederate monument.

The vandalism was discovered Wednesday, at a time when heightened security surrounded President Donald Trump’s visit to Springfield.

The monument is at the Springfield National Cemetery. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs confirms that someone vandalized the statue. The Greene County Sheriff’s Department is investigating.

Confederate monuments have been coming down around the country since the 2015 fatal shooting of nine black parishioners at a church in Charleston, South Carolina, by a 23-year-old white racist. But the pace has picked up since violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, earlier this month.