The Ohio gunman described himself on social media as a pro-Satan “leftist” who wanted Joe Biden’s generation to die off, hated President Trump and law enforcement, and hoped to vote for Sen. Elizabeth Warren for president.
In the early hours of Sunday morning, rifle-wielding Connor Betts rampaged through a Dayton entertainment district, killing his sister and eight other people and leaving dozens of others wounded before police killed him.
“I want socialism, and i’ll not wait for the idiots to finally come round to understanding,” he wrote in one tweet, according to Heavy.com.
The breaking-news outlet said it had found Betts’ Twitter page (handle @iamthespookster) and verified that the account belonged to the gunman “through multiple verification factors, including a matching tattoo on both a page selfie and prominent news outlets’ pictures of Connor Betts; several family linkages to the page; similar photos, including of him and the family dog, on the page and family members’ verified accounts; and references to college and growing up in Ohio and Dayton.”
The Twitter account painted a picture of a left-wing anarchist and discontent, very far from the anti-immigration manifesto posted by Saturday’s El Paso gunman.
“Vote blue for gods sake,” he wrote last Nov. 2. On the day of the senator’s death, Betts wrote “F—k John McCain.”
Though he had a fascination for guns, Betts also was a fan of gun control and blamed Republicans for school shootings.
“This is America: Guns on every corner, guns in every house, no freedom but that to kill,” he wrote in December, and on the day of the Parkland, Florida, school shooting, he tweeted at Sen. Rob Portman: “hey rob. How much did they pay you to look the other way? 17 kids are dead. If not now, when?”
In reference to the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, he wrote “you can’t kill 50+ people and injure 600(!) In 10 minutes with cigarettes my dude.”
Politically, Betts was on the far left. His pinned Top Tweet was a retweet of someone else’s claim that “Millennials have a message for the Joe Biden generation: hurry up and die.”
When another Twitter user posted a picture of Ms. Warren and 2020 Democratic presidential rival Kamala Harris and asked “co-Presidents?” Betts poured scorn.
“Nahh, but only cuz Harris is a cop - Warren I’d happily vote for,” he replied.
When noting that alt-right demonstrators were marching in Charlottesville, a rally that later ended in the death of Heather Heyer, he exhorted his followers: “Kill every fascist.”
According to Heavy, Betts also shared posts about “concentration camps” at the border and wrote, “Cut the fences down. Slice ICE tires. Throw bolt cutters over the fences.”
His profile specified his preferred pronouns as “he/him.”
As of Sunday, Dayton police said they had no proof of Betts’ motive.
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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