School shooting conspirator Alex Jones ranted in a video posted on X that this was the beginning of a much broader effort by the deep state to kill powerful figures in the United States, including Biden and Musk.
“Elon, you should go to your bunker immediately, this is a live coup,” Jones wrote on X in a post that has been viewed 6.4 million times.
Others stopped short of directly implicating the Biden campaign but claimed the shooter was inspired by the campaign’s rhetoric, though none of the accounts pushing this narrative shared examples to back up their claim.
“Today is not an isolated incident,” wrote Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, one of the candidates considered to be Trump’s running mate, in a post on X that has been viewed nearly 9 million times. “The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric directly led to the attempted assassination of President Trump.”
There have been no reports released on the shooter’s motivations so far.
On online conspiracy channels, many Trump supporters pointed to an interview with a witness who saw the gunman climb onto the roof with a rifle and told police minutes before the shooting. The inaction of law enforcement, the posters claimed, is a sign that the apparent assassination attempt was coordinated by the “deep state.”
“Deep-State, how can you not hit a roof from 160 yards away? He fired 5 shots and then died!” wrote one X user.
Other Republican lawmakers blamed the media for the attack.
“The Democrats and the media are to blame for every drop of blood shed today,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia wrote on X. “For years and years, they have demonized him and his supporters. Today, someone finally tried to take down the leader of our America First and the greatest president ever.”
“The Trump-deranged leftist LUNATICS parading around MSNBC and other FAKE NEWS ‘media’ demonizing Trump and calling him Hitler are DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE for this violent attack on President Trump’s life. They have BLOOD on their hands,” Rep. Ronny Jackson of Texas, who previously served as Trump’s White House physician, wrote on X. Jackson also said his own nephew was grazed by one of the bullets fired at the rally.
In the more conspiratorial corners of the internet, posters blamed everyone from China to the Mossad, billionaire philanthropist George Soros, former President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for the attack — all claims unsupported by any evidence.
One of the wildest conspiracy theories circulating about the shooting involves a man named Vincent Fusca, who has been a major figure in the QAnon world for years. Fusca, who many QAnon followers believe is John F. Kennedy, Jr. in disguise, was sitting behind Trump at Saturday’s rally, and when the shots rang out he didn’t move. This, according to people on QAnon Telegram channels, is proof that he was orchestrating the entire incident.
Several pro-Trump accounts were also flagged. a video Three months ago, a video was used as proof that this was a grand plan. In the video, an evangelical “prophet” claimed to have had a dream about an assassination attempt on Trump, in which the bullet passed so close to his head that it shattered his eardrum.
Pro-Trump message boards also celebrated Trump’s survival, extolling an image of Trump surrounded by his Secret Service agents and raising his fist toward the crowd.
“This will be a statue someday,” wrote one member of the far-right message board known as The Donald. “I just ordered a shirt with that image on it. It’s iconic enough to win an election if enough people see it,” wrote another, referring to a shirt with an image of Trump with his fist raised that sold for $35, with all proceeds going to Trump’s campaign, according to the seller.