Uhm… no. It’s clear. He’s a young MAGA cultist, gun nut known for his extremist views. Considering the history of young, MAGA cultist gun nuts who commit violence I don’t think it’s a stretch to eschew going the extra mile to make sure you don’t make any assumptions about motive. They could have written the article without saying the motive is “a mystery.”
Ikner had just transferred to Florida State University from Tallahassee State College and enrolled this semester as a political science major. He remains hospitalized with serious but non-life-threatening injuries after he was shot by law enforcement, police said.
As the investigation widened Friday into what led to the gunfire, students who knew the accused gunman described him as a troubled young man who openly talked about having a weapon.
“He would joke about mass violence,” said Lucas Luzietti, who shared a national government class with Ikner when he was at Tallahassee State College. “And he did talk about how he used guns and had access to them.”
“He espoused the election denialism belief that Joe Biden was not the legitimate president, he said that Rosa Parks was in the wrong, he also talked about how Black people are ruining his neighborhood and Stonewell was bad for society,” Luzietti said. “He would also talk about how multiculturalism is dangerous.”
Reid Seybold, a senior at FSU who said he first met Ikner at Tallahassee State, recalled Ikner being asked not to return to a political discussion club at his former college because of “white supremacist rhetoric and far-right rhetoric.”
He had a tumultuous childhood in which his parents fought over custody. He ended up changing his name (but unlike JD Vance, only once.) I suppose it’s possible that he was just mad about his grades or something but his extremism indicates that his motive is very likely not “a mystery.”