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It is no surprise that the first presidential assassination of the digital age prompted instantaneous conspiracies.
The internet bends toward skepticism and the scale of an incident like that naturally prompts shock and disbelief—all of which is before we even get to the target former President Donald Trump, whose supporters and detractors have been locked in an eight-year-long battle over reality.
The Trump assassination brings together just about every element of society deemed dubious by his supporters and the institutions his decorators steadfastly stand by: The deep state’s long arm, the FBI‘s previous efforts to oust him, and the media’s public animosity. That has all contrived to convince his supporters that the case will not be properly investigated—by journalists or the government—and never really resolved.
Which means it’s up to them.
Right now, Trump supporters in the deeper corners of the internet are currently obsessed with the shooter. ID’ed by the FBI as Thomas Matthew Crooks within five hours, they are convinced it was someone else.
Primarily they’re obsessed with Crooks’ lack of an internet presence—believing it to either have been wiped clean before the public was given his name or that he kept an intentionally low profile having been long groomed to take the fall for the shooting and confound sleuths.
But they’re even more obsessed with his head. Namely, the idea that the head in an alleged uncensored image of him after death is not him at all.
The obsession—although across the web—was centralized on the most Trump-adoring of platforms, the Reddit clone Patriots.win.
Amateur online phrenologists are doing jaw bone and skull shape analysis on the photos, trying to prove the actual shooter was a self-identified antifa member out of Pittsburgh.
Alongside the high-cheek bones and gaunt face they think Crooks lacked, they’ve pointed to “a big chin, small mouth, a high hairline, and thin, slanted eyebrows.”
Diagrams online are measuring distances between his eyebrows with the precision of an Apple ID face unlock, convinced the images released of Crooks look nothing like the person behind it.
There’s also the ear, which they believe that surveillance footage of Crooks “shows a thick helix and a small space between antihelix” (basically the inner and outer ridges of the ear) and the antifa member (in the shot of him killed), who “has a wide space between the top of helix and anti helix.”
They also are pointing to a “red scar and divot from being stitched up,” which they attribute to photos of the antifa member wearing gauges that he may have gotten removed. Crooks has never been photographed showing gauges.
Other claims pointed to a freckle cluster on his face, which they think matches up. Some of the analysis admits its limitations, noting that the face of the deceased gunman, whoever it be, may be stretched and distorted in the wake of being shot and killed.
But the fact that the antifa member they found had a substantial online footprint—people found his resume, Tumblr, and address associated with him—makes him seem like a more realistic possibility than a 20-year-old ghost.
But why?
The deep state, if it wanted to take out Trump, would naturally need to put some level of effort into it and thus, potentially create plenty of loose ends. If they’d work with this antifa member to plot it, there’d be concerns that he somehow kept receipts. So, they’d need the media looking at Crooks instead.
“Too many groomed breadcrumbs to real shooter who might have stored FBI evidence (promises made by groomers on tape, receipts, photos),” wrote one person. “Too many loose ends leading to his Fed groomers,” echoed another. And if evidence like that existed, the FBI could easily say it’s nothing since it’s not from the perpetrator.
Others noted the popular theory that there were numerous Lee Harvey Oswalds planted across the American South to sow confusion leading up to the Kennedy assassination. Similar questions about Oswald’s face shape—especially when he allegedly visited the Soviet embassy in Mexico—arose throughout independent investigations.
“obvious…..THREE simultaneous Oswalds well documented in great detail. 2 fake fed oswalds.”
“TWO OTHER PROVEN fake oswalds,” one agreed nothing there could be more. “the one who could not speak Russian, on phone call taps, while in Mexico City, plus at least another SIMULTANEOUS other fake Oswald belligerently trying to get spotted making public scenes around Texas. Two amazing PROVEN lookalike Oswalds. FBI phone taps of one fake oswald WAS deliberately destroyed after assassination by FBI. Many big books cover this.”
The concerns are natural given the magnitude of the incident, as well as their long-harbored skepticism. And given the way the Kennedy assassination has never been truly resolved, the only thing keeping this from completely dissolving into an endless mystery is the simple fact that Trump survived.
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