As rumors swirl after political killings, this GOP lawmaker draws a line - WaPo
To Julia Coleman, Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk were just Melissa and Charlie. Coleman, a Republican state senator, knew Hortman, a Democrat, through their work in the Minnesota legislature. The two had discussed reopening the Capitol day care center, while sitting in Hortmans office sharing tequila and Milano cookies. Coleman was Turning Point USAs first Minnesota employee, and Kirk, her first boss, became her friend.
On June 14, Melissa was shot dead. On Sept. 10, so was Charlie.
Coleman, 34, watched in horror as her social media feeds became clouded with a thickening haze of baseless and speculative ideas about her former colleagues deaths. When I see people spreading horrible conspiracy theories that are completely based out of nothing and dishonor the person who passed away, I feel compelled to say something, Coleman said. More elected officials have to stop sitting on their hands and start calling it out. That is what she is trying to do.
On the Sunday after Christmas, Coleman stood in her kitchen, making dinner for her family, when she saw a post that infuriated her. The user claimed Hortmans assassination was connected to a fraud scandal in Minnesota, and they implied Hortman knew her life was in danger. (There is no evidence supporting either of these claims.) This is sick, Coleman thought to herself. She began to type.
I am a Minnesota Republican legislator. I never agreed with Melissa. Not once. But Im begging people to stop sharing this conspiracy theory, Coleman wrote. Please, unless you have evidence, stop trying to get social media clout off the death of a good person that you know nothing about. Within 24 hours, her post attracted more than a million views. Responses have been mostly positive, she said. Coleman sees conspiracies and misinformation trending more on her own side, the political right, but believes the problem transcends partisan loyalties.
(snip)
The conspiracists have relied on a video of Hortman in tears after she voted to end a budget deadlock by supporting a spending plan that cut health benefits for people who are in the country illegally. Coleman has said that Hortman was upset because she knew people would lose health care, and that there is no evidence of any link between the shooting and the scandal, which involves allegations of improper social services payments to dozens of Somali immigrants.
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displacedvermoter
(4,106 posts)hit them where they live.
Igel
(37,326 posts)He left behind a letter and has all kinds of kooky explanations. I mean, if not for the fact that he's obviously gifted and talented and engaged in 5D chess, he'd just be condemned as loony.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/crime/2025/07/16/minnesota-lawmaker-shootings-hortman-hoffman-boelter-details/85235312007/
While Boelter didn't leave behind writings explaining his political beliefs, he did leave behind a letter in an abandoned car near his farm house. The car was left with a cowboy hat on the hood, Thompson said.
A handout photo posted by the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office shows Vance Luther Boelter, 57, the suspected gunman in the shooting deaths of a Minnesota Democratic state lawmaker and her husband, in custody. The photo was released on June 15, 2025.
The letter, addressed to Patel, includes a confession that Boelter is the man who shot the Hoffmans and Hortmans, Thompson said. In the letter, Boelter claimed he was trained by the U.S. military "off the books" and had been "approached" by Minnesota Gov. Tom Walz about killing other lawmakers, Thompson said. The letter also claimed that unnamed people "threatened to hurt his family if he didn't participate."
Thompson said the conspiracy theory was a fantasy.
Then there's Gizmodo's take--that he really was a genius, engaged in a plan to make sure that his family wasn't blamed and the "right people" (meaning 'left', in some obscure sense) were:
The letter is described as 1.5 pages long and incoherent, claiming that Boelter was secretly trained by the U.S. military off the books. The letter was found in Boelters car, according to the Star Tribune, and says that Walz wanted Klobuchar killed so that the governor could run for senate, something hes expressed no desire to do. Theres no evidence anything in the letter is true, but that hasnt stopped conspiracy theorists on X from insisting its evidence that Boelter is actually left wing. ...
Boelters apparent desire to be prepared for extremist scenarios shows up repeatedly in the unsealed court documents. A police search of Boelters car found semi-automatic, assault-style rifles, as well as a large quantity of ammunition organized into loaded magazines, along with wound treatment supplies and eye masks for sleeping.
Boelter, who harbored far-right extremist views on everything from abortion to LGBT rights, allegedly told his family about a bailout plan if anything happened, according to the Star Tribune, which his wife may have followed. Police used cellphone tracking to determine the location of Boelters wife later in the morning of June 14 and found her at 6:18 a.m., according to court documents. She was pulled over and consented to a search of her phone, which revealed that she and others in the family received a text that read, Dad went to war last night I dont wanna say more because I dont wanna implicate anybody.
Boelter apparently told his family to leave their house because he was afraid police would come looking. Another text to his family read: Words are not gonna explain how sorry I am for this situation theres gonna be some people coming to the house armed and trigger-happy and I dont want you guys around.
Police found two handguns in the car of Boelters wife along with about $10,000 in cash, according to the documents. Her passport and passports for her children were also in the car.
I guess the letter was the bailout plan. Or maybe it was the cash and guns and passports. (I haven't seen anything saying that said she knew or didn't know about the cash/guns/passports. Or the timing of the of his warning text. But nothing shouts 'innocence' like being on the lam with weapons, cash, and passports. Or maybe the text was the 'plan'? Dunno. Would be interesting to read the charging document and prosecutions briefs to see what their claims are.)
Sounds less right than blighted and less left than bereft of sanity, and more loon than goon.
Here, I've only seen claims that he might be right because he aimed left. But that kind of logic means Kirk's shooter must be left because he aimed right. I find ignorance to be a horrible place to build a theory.