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      Trump and other Republicans mock Democrats after Minnesota lawmaker killings

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      Utah senator Mike Lee sounded like a lot of other Republican politicians after the fatal shootings of Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota this weekend.“These hateful attacks have no place in Utah, Minnesota, or anywhere in America. Please join me in condemning this senseless violence, and praying for the victims and their families,” he wrote on Twitter/X.That was from his official account. On his personal X account, he posted a series of memes concerning the attacks that left former Minnesota state house speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark dead, and state senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette seriously injured.“This is what happens When Marxists don’t get their way,” Lee posted, along with a photo of the alleged gunman, who was arrested on Sunday. He followed that up by posting the photo and writing “Nightmare on Waltz Street”, an apparent misspelling of Tim Walz, the state’s Democratic governor who became nationally known last year as Kamala Harris’s running mate.Such was the split screen that played out among Republicans after the Saturday morning shootings, which were the latest in a wave of political violence across the United States that has most recently seen two assassination attempts targeting Donald Trump as he campaigned for president, a flamethrower attack on a rally for Israeli hostages in Colorado and a slew of threats targeting judges who have ruled against the US president.While many in the GOP condemned the attacks in Minnesota, others have used it as an opportunity to poke fun at their Democratic opponents, or suggest that they somehow instigated the violence. Experts warn it may be the latter statements that reach the bigger audience.“I think there’s no question that these messages are representative of the modern GOP more so than any stock thoughts and prayers tweet that a staffer puts up,” said Jon Lewis, a research fellow at George Washington University’s Program on Extremism.Democrats have been unequivocal in condemning the shootings, as have Congress’s top Republicans. “Such horrific political violence has no place in our society, and every leader must unequivocally condemn it,” said House speaker, Mike Johnson. Senate majority leader, John Thune, said he was “horrified at the events unfolding in Minnesota” and that “political violence has no place in our nation”.Minnesota’s Republican party condemned the shooting, as did the state’s entire congressional delegation.But when it comes to Trump and his most vociferous allies on social media, the message is more mixed. Trump initially condemned the attacks, saying on Saturday: “Such horrific violence will not be tolerated in the United States of America. God Bless the great people of Minnesota, a truly great place!”But the following day, he struck a different tone, telling ABC News that the shooting was “a terrible thing” but calling Walz “a terrible governor” and “a grossly incompetent person”. “I may call him, I may call other people too,” he added. On Monday afternoon, Walz’s office said Trump had not called.Meanwhile, on X, prominent rightwing figures were quick to promote conspiracy theories about what happened. Elon Musk, the erstwhile Trump sidekick who runs Tesla, shared a tweet from a pro-Trump account that read, in part: “The left has become a full blown domestic terrorist organization.”“The far left is murderously violent” Musk wrote in his reply, which Lee shared, adding: “Fact check: TRUE”.Laura Loomer, the rightwing extremist who is said to have played a role in encouraging Trump to fire national security officials, alleged the suspect had ties to the “No Kings” protests that took place nationwide on Saturday, and that Walz knew him.The spread of outlandish falsehoods and conspiracy theories on social media has been a hallmark of the atmosphere Trump has brought to US politics over the past decade, and Lewis believes the country is now at a point where such fabrications have more prominence than politicians’ carefully written statements.“The real problem now is that nothing matters, and I think that has been realized by the mainstream right in this country. There are no consequences for peddling disinformation or conspiracies,” he said.Robert Pape, director of the University of Chicago Project on Security and Threats, said that the United States had entered an era of “violent populism”, and if Democrats and Republicans want to stop it, they need to issue joint statements speaking out against atrocities like what happened in Minnesota.“You’ve got to start having some agreement here on negotiating these rules of the road, so to speak, because if each side continues to simply only accept unconditional surrender by the other, well, then just like in Ukraine, you’re not going to end this thing very, very soon, and things will just escalate,” Pape said. More

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      Suspect in Minnesota shootings visited other legislators’ homes, say authorities

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      A man accused of dressing up as a police officer and shooting two Minnesota state lawmakers in their homes – killing one and her husband – also showed up at the houses of two other legislators the same night intending to assassinate them too, authorities revealed on Monday.Vance Luther Boelter, 57, was captured on Sunday night after a major two-day manhunt and charged by state prosecutors with the second-degree murder of the Democratic representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, at their residence in Brooklyn Park early on Saturday.He was also charged with the attempted murder of state senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, at their home in Champlin.Appearing in federal court in St Paul, Minnesota, on Monday, Boelter said he could not afford an attorney. A federal public defender was appointed to represent him. A hearing about whether Boelter should be detained in federal custody pending the outcome of his case was tentatively scheduled for 27 June.The court appearance came after officials announced a separate 20-page federal indictment, which could include the death penalty for Hortman’s murder, at a late-morning press conference.The acting US attorney for the district of Minnesota, Joe Thompson, told reporters that as well as the early-hours attacks on the Hortman and Hoffman residences, Boelter was spotted at the homes of two other unnamed lawmakers, one a state representative, the other a state senator, in a “planned campaign of stalking and violence”.At one of the properties, nobody was home, he said. At the other, he was confronted by a police officer who was called to make a wellness check, and fled the scene.“It is no exaggeration to say that his crimes are the stuff of nightmares,” Thompson said.“Boelter stalked his victims like prey. He went to their homes, held himself out as a police officer, and shot them in cold blood.”Hortman’s killing, at the final house he visited, “was a political assassination”, he added.“It’s a chilling attack on our democracy, on our way of life. The trend [of political violence] has been increasing over recent years and I hope it’s a wake-up call to everyone that people can disagree with you without being evil, without [anybody] needing to be killed for it.”Thompson gave a timeline of Boelter’s alleged spree, which began at the Hoffmans’ home. Arriving in a black SUV disguised to look like a police vehicle, and wearing a “hyper-realistic latex mask”, Boelter knocked on their door claiming to be a police officer, and shot them both repeatedly after they opened the door and realized he was not who he claimed to be.Both remain in hospital in serious condition but are expected to survive.Next, Thompson said, Boelter drove to the home of a Minnesota state representative in Maple Grove, where a doorbell camera captured him at 2.24am. She was on vacation, and he left.From there, he traveled to the home of a state senator, arriving at about 2.36am. An officer from the New Hope police department arrived to find Boelter’s vehicle parked a short distance away with lights on.Thompson said she assumed he was a fellow officer already there in response to the Hoffman shooting – but when she wound down her window to speak to him, Boelter did not respond, and “just sat there and stared straight ahead”, Thompson said.She retreated to the senator’s home to await the arrival of colleagues, who arrived to find him gone.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionFinally, Thompson said, he drove to the Hortmans’ home in Brooklyn Park. Officers arrived at about 3.30am to find him standing on the porch – and when they got out of their vehicles, he began firing at them, forced his way into the house and shot and killed Hortman and her husband, then fled on foot.“Boelter planned his attack carefully. He researched his victims and their families,” Thompson said.“He used the internet and other tools to find their addresses and names, the names of the family members. He conducted surveillance of their homes and took notes about the location of their homes.”He said he could not speculate on a motive, but said investigators found “dozens and dozens of names on hundreds of pages of documents” in the vehicle retrieved at the Hortman residence. All the elected officials targeted were Democrats, Thompson said.The writings and list of names are believed to include prominent state and federal lawmakers and community leaders, along with abortion rights advocates and information about healthcare facilities.An FBI affidavit states that after the shootings Boelter used cash to purchase a vehicle from a stranger, and then drove to Green Isle, about an hour west of Minneapolis, where a police officer reported seeing him run into woodland.The Brooklyn Park police chief, Mark Bruley, said about 20 different tactical teams searched inside a perimeter for him and he was located after an hours-long operation that included a helicopter.When Boelter was found, Bruley said, he crawled out of the woods after “a short period of negotiation” and was taken into custody in a field.In the vehicle there, police allegedly found a handwritten confession, while a search of his wife’s car yielded two handguns, passports and $10,000 in cash, the affidavit said.It states that Boelter texted his wife: “Words are not gonna explain how sorry I am for this situation. There’s gonna be some people coming to the house armed and trigger-happy and I don’t want you guys around.”The superintendent of Minnesota’s bureau of criminal apprehension, Drew Evans, told a Sunday news conference that authorities interviewed Boelter’s wife and other family members in connection with Saturday’s shootings and that they were cooperative and not in custody. More

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      in US Politics

      Violence is coming to define American political life | Stephen Marche

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      America reached its apex of self-parody shortly after 7pm on 14 June 2025. In that moment, the background band at Donald Trump’s military parade segued from Jump by Van Halen to Fortunate Son by Creedence Clearwater Revival, just after the announcer explained that M777 howitzers are made out of titanium.Nobody, apparently, had considered the lyrics: “Some folks are born, made to wave the flag, they’re red, white and blue, and when the band plays Hail to the Chief, they point the cannon at you.” If this was some kind of surreptitious protest by the musicians, I salute them, but given the time and the place, sheer obliviousness is a better explanation. The crowd, pretty thin, did their best imitation of a cheer.The US clearly does not know how to do an authoritarian military parade. To be fair, they are just getting started. Authoritarian military parades are supposed to project invincible strength. They are supposed to make your own people impressed with the inhuman discipline of your troops, and to strike fear into your enemies at the capacity of your organization. In Trump’s parade, the soldiers resembled children forced to participate in a half-assed school play, trying to figure out how to avoid embarrassment as far as possible, and the military itself looked better suited to running a Kid Rock tour than a country’s defence.But do not confuse Trump’s debased parade with a joke or an innocent piece of entertainment. The Trump parade took place in the immediate aftermath of the assassination of Melissa Hortman, a Minnesota state representative. While it was under way, security forces were firing teargas on protesters in Los Angeles.Violence is coming to define American political life – spectacular violence including the parade and real violence like the assassination of Hortman. Political destabilization is arriving far too quickly to be perceived in its entirety. So much is happening so fast that it’s impossible to keep track of the decline. Increasingly, the question is becoming: when are we going to start calling this what it is?When I published my book The Next Civil War in 2022, the US was very far from the threshold of what the experts at the Peace Research Institute Oslo defined as civil war, which is 1,000 combatant deaths a year. They defined civil conflict as a 1,000 combatant deaths a year, so the US already fits comfortably in that category. But the definitions of war and conflict never applied perfectly to the American reality, because it is so much bigger and so much more geographically diverse than other countries. As we start to see violence overtaking American political life, the transition is more like a sunset than a light switch. Every day violence becomes more and more settled as the means of US politics.The parade, and the “No Kings” counter-protests, were both distractions from the fact that American political life is moving away from discourse altogether. Don’t like what the senators of the other party are saying? Handcuff them. Don’t like protestors? Send in the marines. Don’t like the makeup of the House of Representatives in Minnesota? Kill the top Democrat. The political purpose of the parade, from Trump’s point of view, was to demonstrate his mastery of the means of violence. He needed to show, to the military and to the American people both, that he can make the army do what he tells it, and established traditions and the rule of law will not alter his will.But the primary effect of the parade was to demonstrate an immense weakness, in Trump and in the American people. It was a parade reminiscent of the most vacuous regimes in history. In 1977, Jean-Bédel Bokassa, the leader of the Central African Republic, declared himself emperor and indulged in a coronation that imitated the coronation of Napoleon I in immaculate detail. He even went so far as to use eight white Norman horses to pull the carriage, but the French horses were not used to the climate and several died. Trump’s parade felt like a lazier version of that.The spectre of defeat hovered over the entire celebration of supposed strength. The last time the US military threw a parade was 1991, which was the last time they triumphed over an opponent, the last time their war machine produced the results they had been attempting. The US has not won a war since then. But hey, if you can’t win a war, at least you can throw a parade.Except they couldn’t even throw a parade! The end of the show was almost too perfect. A frail Lee Greenwood, a country singer long past his “best before” date, sang God Bless America raggedly, lousily. “Our flag still stands for freedom,” he sang. “They can’t take that away.” O can’t they? Trump at the center fidgeted like a rich kid bored with his servants and toys. The whole business was like watching some sordid fairy tale: the unloved boy who everybody hated grew up to force the American people to throw him a birthday party and give him a flag. And then almost nobody came.What’s true of men is also true of countries: the more they need to show off how strong they are, the weaker they are. The weakness, rather than the strength, is terrifying. Whoever is so scared and so needy as to need that parade is capable of anything. That goes for Trump, and that goes for his country.

      Stephen Marche is the author of The Next Civil War More

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      in US Politics

      Suspect in shootings of Minnesota lawmakers charged with two counts of murder

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      The man suspected of opening fire on two Minnesota legislators and their spouses on 14 June, killing one legislator and her husband, was apprehended late on Sunday night and charged with two counts of murder and two of attempted murder, the state’s governor, Tim Walz, said at a news conference.Vance Boelter, 57, is suspected of fatally shooting the Democratic state representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, at their residence early on Saturday. Boelter is also suspected of shooting the state senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, at their home, seriously injuring them.“One man’s unthinkable actions have altered the state of Minnesota,” the state’s governor, Tim Walz, said at a news conference.Boelter was arrested in a rural area in Sibley County, southwest of Minneapolis, according to police, who added that he was armed when he was taken into custody. A criminal complaint unsealed Sunday night said Boelter faces two counts of second-degree murder and two counts of attempted second-degree murder in the deaths of the Hortmans and the wounding of Hoffman and his wife.Authorities alleged Boelter fled on foot after police responded to a shooting at Hortman’s house. Authorities alleged Boelter was wearing a police uniform that so closely resembled an actual law enforcement uniform that most civilians wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.Earlier Sunday, Drew Evans, superintendent of the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said at a news conference a nationwide warrant had been issued for the suspect’s arrest.Evans said authorities found a car very early Sunday they believed Boelter was using, a few miles from his home in Green Isle, in the farm country about an hour west of Minneapolis. He also said they found evidence in the car that was relevant to the investigation, but did not provide details.The superintendent also said authorities interviewed Boelter’s wife and other family members in connection with Saturday’s shootings. He said they were cooperative and were not in custody.The FBI had issued a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to his arrest and conviction. They circulated a photo taken Saturday of Boelter wearing a tan cowboy hat and asked the public to report sightings.On Sunday evening, US Senator Amy Klobuchar shared a statement from Yvette Hoffman expressing appreciation for the outpouring of public support.“John is enduring many surgeries right now and is closer every hour to being out of the woods,” Yvette Hoffman said in a text that Klobuchar posted on social media. “He took 9 bullet hits. I took 8 and we are both incredibly lucky to be alive. We are gutted and devastated by the loss of Melissa and Mark.” More

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      in Elections

      Many Lawmakers Share Their Home Addresses. Political Violence Is Changing That.

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      The Minnesota assassination is causing some state legislators to rethink home security and how much personal information they make public.When an assassin visited the homes of two Minnesota lawmakers on Saturday, it exposed the longstanding tension between a public official’s accessibility and their security.Both State Representative Melissa Hortman, who along with her husband Mark was killed, and State Senator John A. Hoffman, who along with his wife Yvette was wounded, readily shared their home addresses with constituents. Ms. Hortman’s address was listed on her campaign website, and Mr. Hoffman’s address had been listed on his official legislative webpage, a common practice in many states.But in the hours after the shootings, while police officers were still searching for the assassin, lawmakers across the country began to rethink their approach to privacy and safety. The Michigan State Police held security briefings for legislators. The police in Fairfax County, Va., increased patrols around lawmakers’ homes. And in North Dakota, officials decided by midday Saturday to scrub home addresses from legislator biography pages.“In light of the tragedy in Minnesota, we quickly decided to remove all addresses until our leaders have time to assess the proper balance between transparency and safety of our elected officials,” John D. Bjornson, the director of the North Dakota Legislative Council, said in an email.In interviews with lawmakers across the country, some said sharing their home address helped reassure constituents that they were part of the community and could be easily reached. But unlike governors and presidents, most state lawmakers have no special security protection when they are away from work. The country’s coarsening public discourse has left them to weigh difficult trade-offs.“Part of the reason why my address is easily found is to make it clear that I actually live in my district,” said Stephanie Sawyer Clayton, a Democratic state representative in Kansas. “If you have a P.O. box, you don’t look authentic, right?”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Manhunt continues for suspect in shootings of Minnesota lawmakers

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      The hunt for the man suspected of shooting two Minnesota lawmakers and their spouses while impersonating a police officer, killing one legislator and her husband, continued on Sunday more than 24 hours after the killings.Vance Boelter, 57, now on the FBI’s most wanted list, is believed to have left the Minneapolis region after allegedly gunning down Democratic state representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, at their home, according to CNN. Boelter is also suspected of shooting Democratic state senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, at their residence, gravely injuring them; a relative posted on Facebook that they were out of surgery and recovering.Authorities have disseminated photos of Boelter to border patrol agents in case he tries fleeing to Canada, CNN said.The Minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar said on Sunday that authorities believe Boelter remains in the midwest. Klobuchar said on NBC’s Meet The Press that “he may be” in Minnesota and that law enforcement has issued an alert in South Dakota.“We believe he’s somewhere in the vicinity and that they are going to find him,” Klobuchar said. “But right now, everyone is on edge here because we know that this man will kill at a second.”An emergency alert was issued in Sibley county, which is approximately one hour from Minneapolis, around 12pm after Boelter’s vehicle was discovered, according to local Fox anchor Chenue Her. “Officials are telling residents nearby to take precaution as they continue searching for Boelter,” Her also reported.Klobuchar urged the public to be cautious if they see Boelter, warning they “should not approach him, that they should immediately call the tip lines and report”.View image in fullscreenPolice responded to a shooting at Hoffman’s house at about 2am local time, then went to check on Hortman, who lives approximately 9 miles away. When they arrived there around 3.30am they encountered Boelter, who was dressed as a police officer. They said he exchanged shots with them before escaping on foot.Hoffman’s nephew, Mat Ollig, told the Minnesota Star Tribune that both were recovering from surgery. In a Facebook post, Ollig said that Yvette saved their daughter’s life.“Early this morning, an absolute vile piece of shit dressed as a cop broke into my aunt and uncle’s house and shot him 6 and my aunt 5 times in a political act of terrorism. My aunt threw herself on her daughter, using her body as a shield to save her life,” Ollig wrote.“These two are the kindest, most giving and caring people I know. He went into politics to help people with disabilities get the care they need, and she works with young school children. They have always been there for me and everyone in our family and community.”Police said Boelter’s uniform might appear authentic to most people.Boelter also drove a vehicle that appeared identical to an SUV police squad car, said Mark Bruley, a local police chief. “It was equipped with lights, emergency lights, that looked exactly like a police vehicle, and yes, they were wearing a vest with Taser, other equipment, a badge very similar to mine, that, no question, if they were in this room, you would assume that they are a police officer,” Bruley said.Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, said the murders appear “to be a politically motivated assassination”.The Federal Bureau of Investigation has offered a $50,000 reward for information leading to Boelter’s apprehension and conviction. He was added to the FBI’s most wanted list on Saturday.Before the attacks he reportedly contacted two friends by text message, which they read aloud to the Star Tribune: “I made some choices, and you guys don’t know anything about this, but I’m going to be gone for a while. May be dead shortly, so I just want to let you know I love you guys both and I wish it hadn’t gone this way.”He added: “I don’t want to say anything more and implicate you in any way because you guys don’t know anything about this. But I love you guys and I’m sorry for all the trouble this has caused.”Authorities reportedly said that Boelter left a list of potential targets at the shooting scene. Multiple outlets have reported that it included pro-choice lawmakers, as well as reproductive health clinics.“There clearly was some through line with abortion because of the groups that were on the list, and other things that I’ve heard were in this manifesto. So that was one of his motivations,” Klobuchar said.She also urged the public not to make any assumptions and allow investigators to work. “But again, they’re also checking out, did he have interaction somehow with these without legislators? Is there more to this?”The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that 11 lawmakers in the state of Wisconsin were also among the targets listed in Boelter’s alleged manifesto.Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader, said on MSNBC that he expects to convene with congressional leaders to discuss ramping up security for lawmakers across the country in the wake of the deadly attacks.“This should be another wakeup call amongst many that have happened over the last several years, including, of course, the violent attack on the Capitol that took place on January 6,” Jeffries said. More