As Ed pointed out this morning, authorities have named the suspect in the Boulder, Colorado supermarket shooting. Ahmad al-Issa is apparently a foreign national and a believer in Islam but as Ed also noted, it’s looking like he may have some longer term mental issues. Heavy found some Facebook posts from 2019 in which he’s talking about his high school hacking his phone. It’s too early to say for sure what the motive is here but undiagnosed schizophrenia has entered the chat as a possibility.

But before we knew the shooter’s name or identity, there were lots of people on social media ready to jump to politically popular conclusions about who the shooter would be. Caleb Hull put together a thread highlighting some of the journalists and other blue-check Twitter users who ran with the white domestic terrorist narrative before having any facts.

THREAD: Here are all the idiotic leftists who immediately jumped to politicize the tragic Boulder shooting to push their narrative, only for it all to fall apart when it turns out the shooter is muslim…

Deadspin Editor: pic.twitter.com/pcPUgdPas3

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

"Activist, feminist, author"

How she reacted when she thought the shooter was white vs. when he turned out to be muslim: pic.twitter.com/V0Lj6ms2im

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

There is a clear social media benefit to those posting stuff like this. Thousands or tens of thousands of likes for the person who tells the audience what they want to hear.

"Two different Americas," he says as he pulls in 125,000 likes on a tweet that is completely false. pic.twitter.com/zNDg935dG2

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Some were quick to also make light of the possibility the shooter could have mental issues or rather to assume that those excuses would only be offered if the shooter was white.

"He was white," he says about the man who was not, in fact, white. pic.twitter.com/xSxpso8Jxt

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Rosanna Arquette is on record saying she’s sorry she was born white.

(that is not what it is) pic.twitter.com/gzoZfzXnUa

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

In their minds, these people not only know who the shooter was, they know why he did it. It was the white virus.

and again… pic.twitter.com/td9I3ajphS

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Some were ready to connect it to the shooting in Atlanta to create a bigger narrative about white terrorists.

Hey @meenaharris, I saw you deleted this tweet! Is it because the shooter isn't white and is actually muslim? pic.twitter.com/BNopAjBawI

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Meena Harris later deleted that tweet and issued a non-apology.

I don't see an apology here. https://t.co/smI1VELdhN

— Pradheep J. Shanker (@Neoavatara) March 23, 2021

Jared Yates Sexton (who may be a distant relative) says it’s about the white culture of entitlement.

"The right relies on them for fundraising, political power, and intimidation against democracy."

Okay, then what do we call it when you push a false narrative immediately after a shooting that turns out to be totally false? pic.twitter.com/FYOXQrcqYT

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Lots of people were keying on the fact that the shooter survived as proof he was white: “We KNOW cops are capable of treating ppl humanely…just not us,” Michael Harriot wrote.

Amazing how many people jumped on this narrative train. pic.twitter.com/QoWZeM6SKs

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Lots and lots of clicks for this stuff. This message really sells:

"See a trend?" pic.twitter.com/vA9pkvL28U

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

You don’t have to be original just feed into the right narrative. 28,000 likes for this next guy:

Hey @SHEsus__Christ, just saw you deleted this tweet! Just wanted to make sure you don't forget about it! pic.twitter.com/fXvNHaSlnW

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

The guy below tried to tie in cancel culture and only got 475 likes. Too far from the platonic ideal of the white male terrorist meme, I guess.

??? pic.twitter.com/MEQIZ8nM3h

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

Here’s how you get lots of likes:

Hey @lacadri34, just saw you deleted your tweet, blocked me, and tried to push another narrative. Just wanted to make sure everyone sees this! pic.twitter.com/ZLgEAT49w5

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

I think this guy (Alex Cole) set the record for likes on this topic:

170,000 likes pic.twitter.com/7nJwIGf7W4

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) March 23, 2021

I don’t think Caleb Hull ran out of examples I think he just got tired. I’d be willing to bet that for every one of these tweets from a blue check on the left there are dozens from people with small follower counts saying the same thing. That’s usually how it works.

So I have two points to make about this. The first is that all the people leaping to conclusions were wrong and that’s significant because it not only blows a hole in their personal credibility, it also disproves what they were saying. For instance, it’s not true that the suspect would be instantly killed by police if he weren’t white. It’s also not true that as a society we only look at the possibility of mental illness if the shooter is white.

And that brings us to my second point which is the big one. We’re seeing the same reaction here that we saw to the Atlanta shooting. In both cases, there is a particular narrative that a lot of people are very eager to embrace for political reasons. In Atlanta it’s the idea there was a racially motivated attack by a white supremacist which is getting covered up by police. In Boulder, the narrative people clearly wanted was a white domestic terrorist getting special treatment from police.

In the Boulder case, these folks were quickly proven wrong. In the Atlanta case, they may still be proven wrong. Police haven’t found proof the motive in that case was about race even after looking through the shooter’s computer and phone. That could change of course, but the point is that narratives are increasingly getting ahead of the facts. The desire to make white people and police the villains and accomplices in these tragedies is a worrisome trend.

Update: Thanks to Ed who pointed these out to me. A Daily Caller editor highlights two more examples of people in the media who jumped on the bandwagon. The first guy does fact checks for the AFP. The second is the Race and Inclusion editor at USAToday.

LOL the “race and inclusion” editor at USA Today conducting hyperpartisan racial incitement operations on social media. https://t.co/PmB8tS9v3J

— Geoffrey Ingersoll (@GPIngersoll) March 23, 2021