The MRC's Selective Focus On Gun Massacres

The Media Research Center was obsessed with gun massacres involving alleged transgender people -- but didn't really want to talk about the gun massacre involving a straight white teen whose parents bought him the gun he used.

By Terry Krepel
Posted 5/31/2024

Like WorldNetDaily, the MRC sought to exploit the leak of the pages from the alleged manifesto — actually more like notebook rants — of the “transgender shooter” as a way to portray all transgender people as violent and mentally ill. Nicholas Fondacaro huffed in a Nov. 6 post:

On Monday, Nashville authorities, Democratic politicians, and local media types were thrown into a tailspin by conservative podcaster Steven Crowder after he released three pages of the manifesto written by the transgender shooter that targeted elementary students at the Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee earlier this year. Despite the authenticity of the writings being confirmed by multiple outlets (local and national), the broadcast networks of ABC, CBS, and NBC ignored it that night.

Instead of reporting on this massive leak, ABC’s World News Tonight chose to hype Dolly Parton getting inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, CBS Evening News touted Britain’s Price William handing out an environmentalist prize, while NBC Nightly News fretted over the actor’s strike dragging on. Spanish-language networks Univision and Telemundo also refused to cover the leak. NBC’s omission stood out because their local affiliate, WSMV had been reporting on it all day.

Fondacaro made sure to add a “warning” at the top of his post that he would be referencing “excerpts from what is alleged to be the manifesto of the transgender Nashville school shooter. Explicit and derogatory language is used. Reader discretion is advised.” He also complained that a local TV reporter pointed out how right-wingers were trying to exploit the leak:

Another local reporter, Phil Williams, the chief investigative correspondent for News Channel 5, confirmed the pages were real as well but claimed he had “multiple sources” that told him “the selective leak of three pages of the #CovenantSchool shooting ‘manifesto’ is EXTREMELY misleading.” “People who have read the whole thing say ‘there’s something in there for everybody.’ Another, ‘She hated everybody,’” he added.

Williams’ liberal bent was obvious since he put out multiple posts on X (formerly Twitter) lashing out at the “MAGA keyboard warriors” and “MAGA accounts” that were criticizing him.

Fondacaro didn’t explain how Williams pointing out right-wing attacks on him proved a “liberal bent.”

The same day, Jorge Bonilla cited Fondacaro’s post in noting that “news broke of the leak of three pages from the Nashville school shooter’s manifesto (AKA the Nashville Trannifesto), which was covered by ZERO networks” — which, of course, proved Williams right in noting that right-wingers want to exploit the manifesto to peddle transphobia.

The next day, Bill D’Agostino made the transphobic intent explicit in complaining about how non-right-wing media weren’t obsessing over the “transgender Nashville shooter’s manifesto” the way his fellow right-wingers were:

A transgender woman who murdered three Christian schoolchildren and three teachers is a politically inconvenient story for the left generally, and the Democratic party and particular. Perhaps that’s why nobody’s surprised that CNN, MSNBC, and their ilk are attempting to prevent as many people as possible from learning about her professed motive.

Another Nov. 7 post by Fondacaro cheered NewsNation host Chris Cuomo attacking Nashville police for not releasing the alleged manifesto before then, though he grumbled that Cuomo “huffed that the manifesto was going to be ‘weaponized’ by ‘the right’ because of the shooter’s hatred toward them.” Fondacaro didn’t mention that he and his co-workers had been doing exactly that.

Catherine Salgado praised Crowder for leaking the manifesto pages in her own Nov. 7 post:

Louder with Crowder host Steven Crowder says YouTube censored his video exposing parts of the Nashville transgender shooter’s alleged manifesto.

Crowder obtained several pages of the alleged manifesto of Audrey Hale, a biological woman who identified as a man and killed six—including children—at a Christian elementary school in March. Screenshots indicate that YouTube removed Crowder’s podcast episode breaking the story and accused him of “glorif[ying] violent criminal organizations.”

It seems, however, the purpose of releasing the alleged manifesto was to expose Hale’s disturbing philosophy, not glorify it.

Salgado also put YouTube stopping the spread of the leak in a Dec. 5 list of the “WORST Censorship of November” by “big tech,” making sure to note that Hale was “a biological woman who identified as a man.”

Raging transphobe Tierin-Rose Mandelburg tried to repeat the Nashville narrative after another school shooting in a Jan. 4 post:

Early Thursday morning a disturbed individual entered Perry High School in Iowa and fired shots resulting in “multiple gunshot victims.” The suspect has been identified, and it turns out he was a deeply disturbed young man named Dylan Butler who reportedly had numerous ties to the LGBTQ community.

Keep in mind, this story is ongoing. Details are still being released and are subject to change. But so far, reports indicate that the shooting started around 7:37 a.m., just before school began for the day. AP News reported that “Police said a sixth grader was killed and five other people were wounded by a 17-year-old suspect in the shooting Thursday.”

[...]

There’ve also been reports that Butler identified as “gender fluid,” but again, police haven’t confirmed that.

After these reports spread online, users were shocked, but honestly, not surprised given the mental state the alleged shooter seemed to possess. 

At the top of Mandelburg’s list of “users” making a point of highlighting that was the viciously transphobic Libs of TikTok, joined by other haters. Never mind, of course, that nothing had been actually verified about Butler’s identity at the time; Mandelburg’s source was a Twitter/X post by right-winger Robby Starbuck, who quote-tweeted a since-deleted post by Libs of TikTok.

Mandelburg wasn’t the only right-wing hater to rush to judgment; everyone from Donald Trump Jr. to Elon Musk did the same. And neither she and they were going to mention that most mass shootings are carried out by straight men. Indeed, Mandelburg has a narrative she’s being paid to push, however misleading, and she concluded by taking one more stab at pushing it:

This is a tragic and heartbreaking event that needs to be covered to bring awareness to the fact that hurt people hurt people and Butler, if it’s confirmed that he is the shooter, was a hurt individual who needed psychiatric help. But it’s likely this, like the last school shooting that occurred by someone who supported the delusional identities of the LGBTQ mob, will be squashed in the media because it doesn’t fit the establishment narrative.

Again, nothing had been verified about Butler’s identity. Mandelburg was just looking for an excuse to go on yet another anti-LGBTQ rant.

The headline of Mandelburg’s post claimed she was offering “Insight into Suspected Shooter’s LGBTQ Ties.” But there was no "insight"; instead, she offered only the usual right-wing transphobic hate, and there’s nothing insightful about that.

Church shooting narrative fails

The Media Research Center seized on a shooting at Joel Osteen’s megachurch in Houston to push its right-wing narratives about the purported identity of the alleged shooter. First up was Fondacaro, who screeched in a Feb. 12 post the the shooter was a ‘Pro-Hamas Terrorist’:

On Monday, word spread like wildfire that the alleged shooter of the Houston megachurch belonging to Joel Olsteen [sic] was a pro-Palestinian terrorist who had the message “Free Palestine” written on the rifle. It was also discovered that the shooter was transgendered. For hours, far-left MSNBC refused to update their on-air reporting to inform viewers of the likely motive behind the attack. But while CNN News Central had reported the “Free Palestine” message, they danced about the shooter’s transgenderism.

[...]

As he was wrapping up the segment, Miller commented that “there’s a lot going on in the background here trying to figure out who she was, what her story is, and what exactly she was trying to do,” but the message on the rifle was an “interesting indicator.”

As of the publication of this piece, it has been over four hours since CNN first reported on-air that the rifle had “Free Palestine” written on it, and MSNBC still had not mentioned it.

Later that day, chief transphobe Tierin-Rose Mandelburg went on a tirade of more familiar talking points under the headline “Church Shooter Was Transgender, Need We Say More?”

This story is going to vanish from the news faster than the speed of light.

To nobody’s surprise, word just broke that the villain who shot up Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas is a transgender man. And the leftist media, who seems to believe that transgender individuals aren’t suffering from a mental illness, are going to try their hardest to hide that fact, insist that the shooter shot the church because Christians are “bigots,” and/or just not talk about the story at all.

And there are still people who think the media isn’t biased?

Late Sunday afternoon, just before the Spanish-language service at Joe Osteen’s Lakewood Church in Texas, a transgender man – also know as a woman – waltzed into the church with a gun and a child and fired off as many as 12 shots before a Houston police officer and another armed agent who were working off-duty in the church, shot and killed the aggressor. The child was injured and rushed to a nearby hospital in critical condition.

A 57-year-old man was also shot in the leg, and as of Monday both he and the child are in the hospital recovering.

Now it’s become clear that the shooter, born a female named Genesse Ivonne Moreno, was transgender and went by the name Jeffery. Jeffery has a long criminal history stretching for years, including convictions for possession of marijuana, theft, forgery and assault. 

[...]

It’s become obvious that those suffering from mental illnesses have a proclivity to act out in irrational ways, and have started making the list of mass shooters in greater numbers. Look at the record as of late: the Colorado Springs shooter was nonbinary, the Nashville school shooter was transgender as was the shooter in Aberdeen, as well as the gunmen in both the Denver and Iowa school shootings. And now, this.

So when the left tells you that this whole gender ideology nonsense is normal or not affiliated with a mental illness, tell them they’re wrong. We have the receipts.

But it turns out that neither epithet the MRC used for the church shooter was entirely accurate. As Media Matters summarized:

However, initial police reports about the shooter’s identity appear to be inaccurate. Police now say while the suspect has used “both male and female names” as part of her criminal history of forgery, she “has been identified this entire time as female.” Local reporting indicates her “antisemitic writings and conflicts with her ex-husband are being investigated as possible motives for the shooting,” and the suspect was able to legally acquire an AR-15 despite previously being placed under an emergency detention order by Houston police. 

Neither Fondacaro nor Mandelburg mention the fact that the suspect was allowed to legally acquire an AR-15 despite the fact that she shouldn’t have been. Meanwhile, Tim Graham’s Feb. 12 podcast referenced the shooting by claiming that the media was “avoiding inconvenient truths about the attempted shooter at Joel Osteen’s megachurch in Houston”; we can presume he wasn’t talking about the gun.

Meanwhile, Jorge Bonilla was designated to obsess over the shooter’s purported identity in a Feb. 13 post:

The networks each sang from the same hymnal as they covered the awful shooting at Houston’s Lakewood Church: actively excluding the trans identity of the shooter, which caused a great deal of confusion as details of the story were trickling in.

Most emblematic of the news coverage is NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt’s introduction to Morgan Chasky’s report from Houston which, across the dial, was the top story: 

All three networks ran a variant of this common theme with these same basic points: ‘Joel Osteen’s megachurch’, a recount of events, the intervention of off-duty law enforcement, the ‘Palestine’ sticker on the shooter’s rifle and the antisemitic writings found in her vehicle. 

Also echoing across all three networks- the shooter’s mental health state. NBC went above and beyond by noting that the shooter was at one time subject to an emergency detention order.

But missing from all three reports- the shooter’s trans identity. As our friend Chaya Raichik reported: the shooter, who was born female, was detained multiple times under a male identity. There is no explanation of this whatsoever. The public is simply to accept the narrative of the troubled woman at face value. In fact, many were confused as to what the shooter was– male or female- until the medical examiner weighed in.

The “Palestine” sticker and antisemitic writings are explained away as a beef with her ex husband’s family. But even law enforcement stated that it is too early to establish a motive for this shooting. 

Fondacaro returned again in a Feb. 13 post to similarly ratchet up the transphobia:

The second verse, same as the first. In a continuation of their blackout from the previous evening, the Tuesday morning newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC absolutely refused to acknowledge the fact that the attempted mass shooter at the Lakewood megachurch in Houston, Texas was transgender, who would go by male and female names; a fact disclosed by authorities during a press conference.

What they did make sure to note, rightly, was that the shooter was anti-Semitic and a supporter of Palestine. “And it’s that anti-Semitic material combined with the fact authorities saw the word ‘Palestine’ written on the shooter’s rifle, which has them saying that they are not ruling out terrorism or a hate crime as a potential motivating cause here,” NBC correspondent Morgan Chesky announced on the Today show.

[...]

But what neither Chesky nor the rest of the correspondents to be covered here shared was Hassig’s note that the shooter went by different gender identities.

To answer Mandelburg’s headline question: Yes, you and your co-workers needed to say a lot more — specifically, correcting your posts to reflect the actual facts. Then again, we know that narrative trumps truth at the MRC, so we’re not terribly surprised that they won’t correct the record.

A massacre the MRC went silent on

The MRC wasn’t about to let a good narrative go, no matter how inaccurate, so Jorge Bonilla pushed it again in a Feb. 16 post:

Mass shootings, or at least attempted mass shootings, are the kind of story that the media will run with for days because it helps push a policy item that is at the top of the left’s agenda: gun control. But the story has to sit just right. If any narrative element is off or if new, inconvenient details emerge, then the story has to be pulled. Such is the case with Sunday’s shooting at Lakewood church in Houston, Texas.

You recall the initial details: armed individual wearing a trench coat enters into a church and starts shooting. Off-duty law enforcement, some might call them good guys with a gun, quickly stepped in and neutralized the shooter. Unfortunately, a child was shot in the head and another gentleman was grazed in the leg. Even worse for the media, the inconvenient details began to roll in.

The shooter’s identity was a mystery, with both male and female identities. Which one did the shooter decide upon at the time of the shooting? It appears to have been the female identity. Additionally, the shooter was a migrant. Who may have voted in Texas. The story was going sour even before news of the anti-semitic writings broke. Under these circumstances, the corporate national media have no interest in covering a transgender church shooter.

Again: The shooter isn’t transgender, no matter how much Bonilla wishes that to be. He rattled off a list of things seized from the shooter’s home, then whined that non-right-wing media aren’t covering the story to his satisfaction:

Those are a lot of materials, and perhaps even a manifesto explaining the motive. The national outlets speculated as to the motives of the shooting, but quickly moved on to less inconvenient stories.

It would’ve also been nice to know, for example, about all the times law enforcement was called to the shooter’s home. The national media lost interest in this case as soon as the identity of the shooter was made evident. 

What might be in those writings across the assorted electronica seized by law enforcement? Why the extra ammo? What’s on the poster art? A rigorous press might show an interest in covering such things and asking such questions- unfortunately, we haven’t had that in a long time. 

Instead we get silence and get shuttled off to the next story.

But that's exactly what the MRC did .. regarding a different shooting.

When’s the last time you read anything at the MRC about the 2021 school shooting in Oxford, Mich.? You haven't. In the aftermath of the shooting, the MRC engaged in its usual whining that the massacre was being cited as evidence to the need for more gun regulation and Republicans were being called out for their resistance to any common-sense regulation. (Three students were killed in the massacre; by contrast, only the shooter was killed in the church incident.) When a prosecutor charged the teen shooter’s parents for their role in supplying guns to him and ignoring warning signs, Alex Christy groused that it was suggested that “conservatives would make the parents Second Amendment heroes,” getting defensive about the whole thing: “The parents appear to have ignored clear warnings something was wrong with their son by doing nothing to prevent him from accessing the firearm used in the shooting. No Second Amendment advocate supports such reckless behavior.” The MRC also lionized a school football player who “sacrificed his life to save the lives classmates during the tragic shooting at his school.” The MRC did not highlight any list of items seized from the shooter’s house.

The MRC has had little to say about the shooting and its aftermath since. When the parents were later convicted and then sentenced on involuntary manslaughter charges, the MRC remained silent.