April 18: Mass Shootings Are America's Flat Circle
Education Dept. investigates Harvard; Tulsi declassifies Biden's domestic terror strategy; Citizen detained by ICE
The Big Story
A Florida State University student, identified as Phoenix Ikner (per CBS), opened fire on the school’s Tallahassee campus on Thursday, killing two people and wounding six others. Ikner, 20, used the service weapon of his mother, Leon County Sheriff’s Deputy Jessica Ikner, in the attack, according to CNN. Jessica Ikner purchased the weapon after receiving another from the department, Newsmax reports. Sheriff Walt McNeil told reporters at a press conference that Phoenix Ikner was a member of the Leon County Sheriff’s Office and had participated in training programs, suggesting he had some experience with firearms.
Tallahassee Democrat reported that the shooting began at 11:50 a.m. at the Student Union. As sirens blared and law enforcement descended on the campus, students were alerted about the situation roughly 11 minutes after the shooting began. Thirty-eight minutes after that, another text instructed students to shelter in place. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced the shooting on X at 1:43 p.m. It wasn’t until 3:18 p.m. that the school announced the emergency was over. It’s unclear exactly when police shot Ikner, but Fox News reported that the confrontation, which resulted in Ikner being wounded, occurred shortly after the initial shooting. Ikner is currently hospitalized, recovering from gunshot wounds.
Much of Ikner’s traumatic past paints a familiar picture of a troubled young man turned mass shooter. CNN and other outlets reported that his birth mother, Anne-Mari Eriksen, kidnapped him and fled to Norway in 2016, violating a custody order after a prolonged dispute with Ikner’s father. She sued Ikner’s parents that same year, alleging slander and libel, but the case was dropped. Ikner registered as a Republican in 2022, according to NBC News, and the president of Ikner’s debate club told CNN that he had been banned from the group for espousing what members described as white supremacist views. “It’s been a couple of years now. I can’t give exact quotes,” said FSU student Reid Seybold, who attended the debate club with Ikner. “He talked about the ravages of multiculturalism and communism and how they’re ruining America.”
Between the shooter’s extreme right-wing views and Florida’s lax gun regulations, the left, it seems, has a potent new talking point. Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, appearing on MSNBC last night, said these shootings wouldn’t happen without the gun industry’s influence. However, the National Rifle Association’s $2 million spent on lobbying in 2024 (per OpenSecrets) pales in comparison to the more than $387 million spent by the pharmaceutical lobby that same year.
President Donald Trump, responding to a reporter’s question about the shooting yesterday, said it’s his job to defend the Second Amendment but added, “It’s horrible that things like this take place.” Some Democratic lawmakers, such as California Rep. Jimmy Gomez, took the quote out of context, suggesting Trump said, “Things like this take place.”
Cynically seizing upon tragedy to score political points is as American as apple pie. Considering the Democratic Party’s dismal approval ratings—a record low of 29%, according to a CNN poll last month—it’s almost understandable that its leaders would attempt to capitalize on the shooting. Indeed, mass shootings have become, in Nietzsche’s words, a “flat circle.” Like clockwork, a shooting occurs, politicians seize the moment to score political points, and nothing changes. It’s pure political theater, which of course is why it keeps happening. Shootings present an opportunity to fundraise without being expected to follow through by passing actual legislation.
—Adam Lehrer
The Rest
→The Department of Education is investigating foreign donations made to Harvard University, according to a press release issued by the department. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said that Harvard hasn’t been transparent about or complete in its disclosures.
→National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard declassified the Biden administration’s strategic implementation plan for countering domestic extremism Wednesday. Developed in 2021 after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, the plan outlined a government-wide effort to track how foreign actors use disinformation to radicalize Americans and urged coordination with private industry on domestic threats. It also called for measures to curb in-prison radicalization and study extremism within the military, according to Yahoo News. Gabbard declassified the document after being pressured by America First Legal, which was concerned that it led to the “weaponization” of power by “censoring disfavored speech on the Internet by labeling such speech ‘misinformation,’ ‘disinformation,’ ‘hate speech,’ ‘domestic terrorism.’” It’s hard to argue with the group’s concern.
→Following up on yesterday’s Big Story to include a key detail absent from that report: Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s lawyers apparently argued in 2019 that MS-13 is a “Western clique” that only operates in the Long Island area, which the judges who granted his withholding of removal used to dismiss claims that he was tied to MS-13, according to BBC. The Department of Justice, however, repeatedly argued that MS-13 operates in Maryland, where Abrego Garcia lived and was detained. According to the FBI in 2008, MS-13 at that point was already operating in 42 states plus Washington, D.C.
→An American citizen, Juan Carlos Lopez-Gomez, was arrested by Florida Highway Patrol Wednesday after a routine traffic stop led to Immigration and Customs Enforcement placing a 48-hour hold request on him on suspicions that Lopez-Gomez crossed over illegally into Florida. He spent a night in jail, according to Lopez-Gomez’s lawyer, who spoke with CNN. He was freed Thursday night due to pressure put on the authorities by supporters who learned about the case on social media. Earlier Thursday, Lopez-Gomez provided his birth certificate to a judge in a court hearing. The judge said the document was sufficient to throw out the charge of crossing illegally into Florida, but said she still didn’t have jurisdiction to release him due to the ICE hold. Authorities were able to hold him based on a law that allows them to arrest anyone suspected of coming into the country illegally, according to NBC News; that law was temporarily blocked by a judge recently, and the block was upheld by the same judge today. It’s not clear whether the block on that law had anything to do with Lopez-Gomez’s release.
→Video of the Day:
This one will make you queasy. At a press conference in Dallas yesterday for the family of the alleged teenage killer Karmelo Anthony, Jeff Metcalf—the father of Anthony’s 17-year-old victim, Austin Metcalf—showed up at the event. In response, Dominique Alexander, the leader of a local activist group, excoriated him for showing up. “That was disrespectful and just shows you all the character—he was not invited, he knows that it’s inappropriate to be near this family, but he did it,” said Alexander. After Alexander spoke, security guards escorted the grieving father out of the room.
→Image of the Day:
In one of the most lighthearted of recent Oval Office meetings, President Trump met with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni yesterday in what The New York Times called a “smooth affair,” with Trump flattering Meloni with “hyperbolic praise.” The ostensible purpose of the meeting was moving the needle on negotiations between the United States and Europe on tariffs and other issues, which didn’t happen. “We’re in no rush,” said Trump. Beyond that, the two leaders bonded over their contempt for wokeness and DEI policies, but Melondi did voice her opposition toward Trump’s position on Ukraine.
→Post of the Day:
Democratic Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen met with the “father of three” (as legacy media has taken to calling him) and probable MS-13 member Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador yesterday. They did not, however, meet at the Terrorism Confinement Center, as Van Hollen initially intended, likely to create a scandal about the living conditions of the migrants deported there by Trump last month; instead they met at a quaint hotel. El Salvador President Nayib Bukele denied Van Hollen the satisfaction of a politically useful photo op by cleaning Abrego Garcia up, getting him camera ready, and serving them with beverages—margaritas, in fact, if we are to believe Bukele, who is rivaled only by President Trump with the gift of posting.
→An interview worth checking out (despite the interviewer):
Considering a run for the president of Ireland, legendary mixed martial artist and former UFC champion Conor McGregor appeared on Tucker Carlson’s show earlier this afternoon to discuss the ravages that mass migration has wrought on his home country. It’s a shame that Carlson has to be the first American political commentator to advance McGregor’s cause, but the fighter will surprise you with his sober, somber analysis of a country in decline—and his hope for a better future.
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Another aspect missed here about the FSU shooting is the fact that Ilkner has been on some kind of hormone therapy since he was a child due to some sort of developmental growth abnormality, as well as a number of other pharmaceutical drugs.
Once again, the critical aspect of the mental health disorders nearly all of these shooters have in common goes absent from all these reports, including this one in the Scroll.
It’s always strictly the gun’s fault.
I think the democrat approval rating is now down to 21% and senatewhore Van Hollen is obviously trying to get it to zero with his weeping love of criminal illegal alien wife beating, human trafficking, MS 13 thugs.