STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
In a speech to the nation last night, President Biden listed a series of violent incidents in recent years and called on Americans to cool down.
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PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: While we may disagree, we are not enemies. We're neighbors. We're friends, co-workers, citizens, and most importantly, we're fellow Americans. We must stand together.
SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:
The president went on to say there is no place in America for violence like Saturday's assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump.
INSKEEP: The FBI is leading the investigation and NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas is following that investigation. Ryan, good morning.
RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Good morning, Steve.
INSKEEP: What are the facts you know?
LUCAS: Well, the FBI says they believe that the shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Mathew Crooks, acted alone. The main question hanging over this, of course, is motive. And the FBI says at this point, it has not identified a motive or an ideology that drove Crooks. It's investigating the attack as an assassination attempt and possible Domestic Terrorism Act. The FBI official leading this investigation, Kevin Rojeck, spoke to reporters yesterday. He also says investigators haven't found any social media posts or writings that contain threatening language, and he says there's no indication that Crooks had any mental health issues.
We in the media, of course, are also doing our own digging. I have confirmed that Crooks was a member of a shooting range near his home, the Clairton Sportsmen's Club. Crooks was also a registered Republican but had donated $15 to a Democratic group back in 2021, doesn't appear to have had any criminal record. The FBI, though, has its own tools to dig. And officials caution that this is going to be a long investigation and there's a lot of work to be done.
INSKEEP: This feels familiar to a lot of shooting investigations. You have all these data points, they're gathering data points about the person, and in the middle is this question of motive, which is a blank. So what does the FBI do to try to get into that hole?
LUCAS: Well, there are two key pieces of evidence that they have recovered that they're working on, the alleged shooter's gun and his cellphone. Both have been sent to the FBI lab in Quantico, Va., for analysis. Now, the FBI says the gun was purchased legally, it believes by the shooter's father. Rojek identified it as an AR-556, which is an AR-15-style rifle.
The cellphone, though, to your question, is an urgent focus for investigators. The FBI has the phone, but as of yesterday afternoon, hadn't been able to crack into it to get access to its contents. And doing that, of course, would likely reveal a ton of information about the alleged gunman's communications, his whereabouts, text messages and so on. And that would be useful for the FBI. It's trying to build out a timeline, a sequence of events to understand what Crooks was doing, where he was in the weeks, the days and then hours leading up to the shooting.
INSKEEP: I want to think about the way that President Biden framed this. He named a large number of incidents over a number of years. What are authorities making of this wider pattern?
LUCAS: Well, look, two of the top law enforcement officials in this country, Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray, have been warning about the problem of political violence for years now. And there has been a steady drumbeat of violent threats against everything from local election workers and local government officials to federal law enforcement and judges, and, of course, also members of Congress. And there have also been plenty of examples of real political violence as well, some of which President Biden mentioned last night.
Members of both parties have been shot in recent years. Democrat Gabby Giffords Republican Steve Scalise come to mind. There has been violence directed at the FBI. There was the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. And now we have this attempted assassination of former President Trump. Biden in his speech was clearly, as you noted, trying to cool things down and to remind Americans not to head down that path, that violence isn't the way to solve political differences.
INSKEEP: We had a similar statement from House Speaker Mike Johnson on TV over the weekend urging people from both parties to cool down the rhetoric. Ryan, thanks very much for the insights, really appreciate it.
LUCAS: Thanks, Steve.
INSKEEP: That's NPR's Ryan Lucas.
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PFEIFFER: We still don't have a clear understanding of why a gunman tried to assassinate former President Donald Trump on Saturday, so some people are coming up with their own reasons. The shooting happened in the middle of a presidential campaign that was already saturated with conspiracy theories and threats of political violence. We're joined now by NPR's Lisa Hagen and Odette Yousef. Both of you, thanks for being here this morning.
ODETTE YOUSEF, BYLINE: Thank you.
LISA HAGEN, BYLINE: Thanks for having us.
PFEIFFER: Lisa, could you give us a sense of how this has fueled conspiratorial rhetoric?
HAGEN: Yeah, so we still know relatively few facts about what occurred, but that's basically irrelevant when it comes to the alternative and conspiracist media landscape. People there have every incentive not to wait for official information. Social media, we know, helps spread these kinds of narratives. So for example, there are claims without evidence that the Biden administration is somehow behind this. There are claims, also without evidence, that Trump or his supporters may have staged this. Among some Trump supporters, we also see a desire for retribution.
And we've also seen plenty of casual talk, jokes, memes - you name it - about the shooting from people across the political spectrum. Lots of everyday people are also getting caught up. Folks are wrongly identifying the shooter. People have had their addresses posted and family members' names posted online. And we also saw immediate anger at the Trump rally itself at members of the news media. So everyone's looking for someone to blame.
PFEIFFER: Odette, acknowledging that we just heard Lisa say there are relatively few facts, is there any sense at this point whether this is going to be classified as an act of violent extremism?
YOUSEF: Well, the FBI is investigating the incident as an act of domestic terrorism, you know, primarily because this is what they are calling an attempted assassination. But experts say it doesn't yet appear to be a case of violent extremism, because as you said, there's no clear motivation. There hasn't been evidence so far of any connections to organized extremist movements or groups. And, you know, politically speaking, the case isn't clear-cut either. You know, the alleged shooter was a registered Republican, but he also made a single donation to a Democratic organization a few years ago.
And, you know, as confusing as that may sound, it's not terribly strange to people who understand extremism today. Elizabeth Neumann is a former official with the Department of Homeland Security. She's now with Moonshot, which is a company that tracks and tries to deescalate online radicalization.
ELIZABETH NEUMANN: Increasingly, individuals have very fluid ideologies. Sometimes it's not ideological at all, it's just a glorification of violence or glorification of previous shooters, previous attackers. That's very prominent online these days. So we are seeing more and more individuals who carry out these attacks, and they don't fit our categories.
HAGEN: You know, Neumann says what's more helpful instead of trying to categorize people into specific extremist ideologies is to try to understand what was happening in their lives that ultimately led them down this path.
PFEIFFER: Odette, since there are still four months till the election, that clearly has people concerned about possible additional violence. What are you hearing about concerns among extremism experts if they have any?
YOUSEF: Yes, there's a lot of concerns. I spoke about this with Cynthia Miller-Idriss of American University.
CYNTHIA MILLER-IDRISS: We have such a high level of us versus them thinking and the idea of an existential threat and an incredibly armed population that the likelihood that another lone actor tries to take action is always out there as a possibility.
YOUSEF: So there's concern about copycats, revenge acts, militia groups mobilizing or other bad faith actors trying to capitalize on this moment of extreme tension. And, you know, it's especially worrisome because anger is just snowballing against a variety of targets as we wait for actual facts to come out.
PFEIFFER: And, Lisa, as the investigation unrolls, we hopefully will eventually have more information, possibly a motive. But we have seen in the past that even when facts come out, people believe what they want to believe. What's the concern about that here?
HAGEN: We're in a time when trust in all kinds of institutions is very low, in many cases for pretty understandable reasons. So even when we do start to get a clear picture, like you said, from sources like the FBI or what journalists can report up, we're going to see suspicions that crucial things are being hidden from the public. That's a core tenet of conspiracist thinking. I talked with Jared Sexton, who writes on conspiracism and extremism.
JARED SEXTON: This is one of those moments where politicians, journalists, members of the institution, they can make a choice, like we can all make a choice, which is to look at what is happening and continue to make it worse or to understand that a lot of factors and a lot of events have led us to this moment. It's a hinge point.
HAGEN: You know, this moment is also a very good live demonstration of how natural a tendency it is to fill these chaotic information void with anything that makes sense to us. So to answer your question, the truth definitely matters, and this event is going to spin out untold numbers of narratives. Some will undoubtedly linger on and become part of conspiracy canon, and a lot of it will just so happen to coincide with what an individual already believes about the world.
PFEIFFER: That's NPR's Lisa Hagen and Odette Yousef. Thanks to both of you.
YOUSEF: Thank you.
HAGEN: Thanks for having us.
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PFEIFFER: The attack came the weekend before the Republican National Convention, which begins today in Milwaukee.
INSKEEP: Yeah, the gathering aims to nominate Donald Trump for president, although the details will be very different than what was planned just a couple of days ago.
PFEIFFER: NPR's Franco Ordoñez covers the campaign and has been in Wisconsin since the shooting. Good morning, Franco.
FRANCO ORDOÑEZ, BYLINE: Good morning, Sacha.
PFEIFFER: What's the mood in Milwaukee?
ORDOÑEZ: Well, you know, it's certainly on a lot of people's minds here. I spoke with Mia Costello, a member of the RNC platform committee representing Alaska. She's here with her son. You know, she told me this weekend that friends have been texting her to keep her head down if she hears a popping noise. But she really feels safe, despite the tragedy, and thinks people will come together.
MIA COSTELLO: I do believe that in times where our country has seen political violence that it does have the positive effect of bringing people together because we're all human.
ORDOÑEZ: You know, and she says that really goes for both parties, Republicans and Democrats. She still expects, though, most of the convention to focus on policy and speeches to be about the direction of the country.
PFEIFFER: There have been limited sightings of Trump since the shooting, but he has released some statements. What is he saying?
ORDOÑEZ: Yeah, so far he's been pretty tempered. You know, he's calling for unity. But Steve was talking about Biden's speech. You know, Trump's saying similar things about unity and coming together. You know, as we know, Trump's not shy about using strong language. So I'll be very, very interested to see if that tempered, you know, talk kind of continues throughout the convention this week.
PFEIFFER: And meanwhile, there is official business that needs to happen at this convention. Run through us what will take place.
ORDOÑEZ: Yeah, this is a time when party officials on the state and national level, you know, get together to officially nominate the president and the vice president. Trump is scheduled to speak Thursday when he formally accepts the nomination, but as we've been reporting, he is in town already. And we're all waiting, of course, for him to nominate his vice president or name his pick for vice president. He needs to make that announcement before the Republican National Committee holds its roll call vote to officially nominate the running mate. You know, of course, there's going to be a lot of speeches by high-ranking Republicans, including many of those who are on the list to join his ticket.
PFEIFFER: And, Franco, what is the sense of how the shooting will impact the convention?
ORDOÑEZ: Yeah, the RNC says that it's not going to alter any official business, but there's no question it's going to have a strong impact on the speeches and the tenor. I spoke with Doug Heye, a veteran of these events. He's a former RNC spokesman. He told me he'll be watching for the context in which this is discussed.
DOUG HEYE: What we don't know at this point is, what is the impact that this will have on the convention? And will this be a moment of reflection and responsibility or more of a rallying cry with increased heated rhetoric?
ORDOÑEZ: You know, He mentioned past shootings of political figures like former Arizona Congressman Gabby Giffords in 2011. You know, that rhetoric was condemned, but it didn't really go away. And in the midst of Saturday's shooting, Trump was defiant, you know, pumping his fist and mouthing his words, fight. His allies took to social media, blaming Democrats. You know, we're now hearing a more thoughtful response from Trump and his allies. Steve mentioned House Speaker Mike Johnson calling for temperatures to be turned down. So again, I'll be watching for what Trump has to say later this week.
PFEIFFER: That's NPR's Franco Ordoñez. Thank you.
ORDOÑEZ: Thank you, Sacha. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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