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WSJ, Media Outlets Slammed for Spreading Feds' False Claim That Kirk Shooter Expressed 'Transgender Ideology'
"What a truly disgusting week for American journalism," said one transgender writer.
Sep 12, 2025
The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets are facing widespread criticism after publishing a false report that the assassin who shot right-wing activist Charlie Kirk in Utah this week had left behind symbols of "transgender ideology" at the scene of the crime.
On Thursday, with the assassin still at large, the Journal published a news update stating that "investigators found ammunition engraved with expressions of transgender and antifascist ideology inside the rifle that authorities believe was used in the fatal shooting of Charlie Kirk." The report did not identify what these markings were nor the source of the report, instead attributing it to "an internal law enforcement bulletin and a person familiar with the investigation."
The New York Times reported hours later that the bulletin came from the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), but noted that "a senior law enforcement official with direct knowledge of the investigation cautioned that the report had not been verified by ATF analysts, did not match other summaries of the evidence, and might turn out to have been misread or misinterpreted."
It was later revealed that the Wall Street Journal's source of the initial unconfirmed bulletin was Steven Crowder, another far-right influencer known for his antagonism of transgender people.
On Friday, officials revealed the identity of the suspect, a 22-year-old cisgender white man named Tyler Robinson, and Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R) described the marked engravings in detail.
As Erin Reed, a transgender journalist who reports on LGBTQ+ rights, explained, "none were 'transgender' or 'LGBTQ' symbols":
The bullet that killed Charlie Kirk was engraved with the phrase “notices bulges owo what’s this”—a furry and anime meme that has circulated online for a decade, generally meant as a joke about something unexpected. Three other unfired casings were recovered: “hey fascist! Catch! ↑ → ↓↓↓,” a reference to the Helldivers 2 video game code used to drop the 500kg bomb; “O bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao,” the Italian anti-fascist folk song; and “If you read this you are gay lmao,” a trolling insult common in meme subcultures.
In other words: internet detritus. Not a single engraving had anything to do with “transgender symbols,” let alone the trans community.
Data shows transgender people are no more likely to commit acts of gun violence than any other group. According to data from the Gun Violence Archive from the past decade analyzed by The Trace in July, out of more than 5,300 mass shootings, just four of them were committed by a person who identified as transgender or nonbinary.
Despite this, many right-wing activists online have attempted to foment the narrative of a "transgender violence epidemic," often preemptively blaming trans people for shootings that turn out to be perpetrated by others.
This narrative has reached the Trump administration, with the Department of Justice reportedly considering a policy to strip transgender people of the right to own firearms following a school shooting in Minneapolis in August, that was carried out by a transgender person.
Following Kirk's assassination, Donald Trump Jr. said in a Fox News interview, "I frankly can't name a mass shooting in the last year or two in America that wasn't committed by a transgender lunatic that's been pumped up on probably hormones since they were 3-year-olds."
Even after law enforcement and the Journal had begun to walk back the initial report that "transgender ideology" had influenced Kirk's murder, Reed wrote, "the damage was already done, with the falsehood ricocheting across the internet." By this point, numerous media outlets, including the Daily Beast, the New York Post, The Telegraph, and others, had already repeated the claim.
As Reed noted, "conservative influencers flooded social media blaming the killing on transgender people," in some cases using dehumanizing rhetoric.
One conservative activist, Joey Mannarino, who has nearly 640,000 followers on X, and often interacts with elected Republicans, wrote: "If the person who killed Charlie Kirk was a transgender, there can be no mercy for that species any longer. We’ve already tolerated far too much from those creatures."
The falsehood even reached Capitol Hill. Even as law enforcement said Thursday it still had no identity for the shooter, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) told reporters, "It sounds like the shooter was a tranny, or pro-tranny."
Trump Jr., meanwhile, continued to assert that there was "trans paraphernalia written on the cartridges of this rifle that killed one of my dearest friends in life." He described being transgender as "an absolute sickness."
The Journal is now facing harsh criticism for spreading an unverified report that has further fueled the right's demonization of transgender Americans.
"The FBI and Wall Street Journal doing a 'whoops, our bad' after spending a day saying they had evidence it was a trans antifa shooter is so deeply messed up," wrote Ryan Grim of Drop Site News on X.
Charlotte Clymer, a transgender writer, called it a "truly disgusting week for American journalism."
"Nearly 48 hours of relentless anti-trans propaganda and news reports over the murder of Charlie Kirk, and all of that for not a single shred of evidence that trans people or trans rights had anything to do with it," Clymer said. "When do we get a retraction from the Wall Street Journal for erroneously claiming the assassination was related to trans people? When do we get apologies from every journalist who spread that disinformation?"
As criticism has continued to mount, the Journal added an editor's note to the initial article, acknowledging that Cox "gave no indication that the ammunition included any transgender references."
Jeet Heer, a columnist for The Nation wrote in response that the Journal's reporting on this issue was "a scandal."
"The news section of the Wall Street Journal has tarnished its great reputation," Heer wrote. "The only way to recover is to appoint a public editor to review this and explain how it happened to readers."
NOTE: This article has been updated to include the Wall Street Journal's editor's note and subsequent criticism from Jeet Heer.
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FBI Raids John Bolton's Home in Apparent Act of 'Political Retribution' for Trump Criticism
"The government's being weaponized to silence opposition," said one commentator, "and it's only going to get worse."
Aug 22, 2025
The FBI's raid on former national security adviser John Bolton's home in suburban Maryland on Friday morning followed his mounting criticism of President Donald Trump's handling of negotiations on Russia's war with Ukraine, leading several observers to warn that the raid displayed the president's desire for "retribution" against his perceived political enemies.
CNN White House correspondent Alayna Treene reported the FBI's "court-authorized" search of Bolton's home in Bethesda stemmed from the U.S. Department of Justice's "now-resumed investigation into whether he disclosed classified information in his 2020 book," which recounted his time serving as Trump's national security adviser during his first term.
A senior federal law enforcement official also told The New York Times that authorities are investigating allegations that Bolton—a right-wing hawk reviled by human rights defenders for his history of war-mongering both inside and outside of government positions under Republicans administrations, including Trump's—leaked national security information to the media to damage Trump over the past few years, as well as accusations regarding Bolton's book.
Trump and Bolton clashed over foreign policy during the president's first term, with Trump denouncing the former George W. Bush administration official—a key propagandist in the lead-up to the Iraq War and an advocate for violent regime change in numerous countries—as "a hawk" who pushed incessantly for military action against Iran.
In June, Trump bombed three nuclear sites in Iran.
Bolton's push for military action against countries including Venezuela and Iraq, his support for Israel's violent apartheid policies, and his boasting of having "helped plan coups d'etat" in other countries have led anti-war groups and progressive critics to accuse the former national security official of war crimes. Many observers on Friday noted that their alarm over the FBI raid was unrelated to their views on Bolton himself.
"The rule of law is under attack," said constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis of Georgia State University. "We have to zealously defend anyone—even ideologically despised folks—from arbitrary government [attacks]."
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) added that while he has "nothing in common politically" with Bolton, the raid appeared to be "just another step in Trump's march toward authoritarianism."
"Last time I heard, in America, people are allowed to criticize the President of the United States without the FBI showing up on their doorstep," said the senator.
The raid was reportedly ordered by FBI Director Kash Patel, who accused Bolton of being a member of "the Executive Branch Deep State" in a book he wrote in 2023.
Pate posted a public message on X Friday morning saying his agency was "on [a] mission," just as news broke about the FBI raid.
"NO ONE is above the law," he added.
The post exemplified how Patel has "shattered norms intended to minimize public comment suggesting animus toward subjects under investigation," reported the Times.
In recent days, Bolton has accused Trump of failing to impose the "severe consequences" he threatened Russian President Vladimir Putin with if he continued attacking Ukraine, and said Putin "clearly won" the negotiations he had with Trump last week—coming away from them without facing sanctions or requirements for a ceasefire.
Democratic political strategist Mike Nellis said that while he has "no love for John Bolton... the FBI is raiding him for criticizing Trump’s foreign policy."
"The government's being weaponized to silence opposition," said Nellis, "and it's only going to get worse."
In an appearence on CNN, U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) suggested the raid was strategically timed to turn the public's attention away from files regarding the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, which were sent to the House Oversight Committee on Friday under a subpoena. Trump was a known associate of Epstein. As Bloomberg News reported earlier this month, FBI officials redacted Trump's name and the names of other prominent public figures in files regarding Epstein.
Krishnamoorthi on the FBI raiding Bolton's house: "It looks like it's also an attempt to distract from the other big news of the day, which is the first production of the Epstein files that is required by subpoena from the Oversight Committee and they want to change the conversation."
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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) August 22, 2025 at 9:15 AM
"There's a tremendous clamor for these documents and transparency as to these files," said Krishnamoorthi, "and as you know both Donald Trump and Mike Johnson, the speaker of the House, are trying to prevent that from happening, and they want to change the conversation."
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First-of-Its-Kind Lawsuit Seeks to Force Trump Administration to Release Epstein Files
"The only thing transparent about the Trump-Vance administration is how clearly they continue to disregard our nation's laws," said the head of the group behind the suit.
Aug 08, 2025
A pro-democracy legal advocacy group on Friday sued the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation for not releasing documents concerning deceased child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein amid President Donald Trump's stonewalling and attempted deflection of all things related to his former close friend.
In a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Democracy Forward—which has lodged multiple Freedom of Information Act requests with the DOJ and FBI for Epstein-related material—accuses the Trump administration of violating FOIA by failing to produce the files. The suit seeks an order compelling the government "to produce the requested documents in an expedited manner, as required by public records laws."
Tanya Chutkan, the federal judge presiding over the suit, previously oversaw Trump's federal election interference case concerning his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential contest and his incitement of the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection.
BREAKING: We just filed a first-of-its-kind lawsuit demanding records related to the Trump-Vance admin’s handling of the Epstein Files.The only thing transparent about this administration is how clearly they continue to disregard our nation’s laws.
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— Democracy Forward (@democracyforward.org) August 8, 2025 at 6:52 AM
"In January 2024, unsealed court documents disclosed the names of dozens of powerful men with alleged connections to Epstein, including President Donald J. Trump, British Royal Prince Andrew, former President Bill Clinton, lawyer Alan Dershowitz, and others," the lawsuit states.
"This and other information raise persistent questions about what the government uncovered during the years of investigation into Epstein's criminal activity," the filing continues. "Accordingly, there is broad-based public pressure for the government to release that information by disclosing records that are often referred to as the 'Epstein files.'"
"There is widespread public speculation that the Epstein files contain a roster of powerful clients to whom Epstein trafficked underaged girls," the lawsuit adds. "This list has become known as the 'Epstein list' or the 'client list.'"
The suit notes that Trump said during his 2024 presidential campaign that he was inclined to release the Epstein files. The filing also references U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi's claim that the list was "sitting on my desk right now to review," and highlights reported "frantic scrubbing" of Trump's name from relevant documents by DOJ and FBI teams.
Furthermore, the lawsuit recounts Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche's recent meetings with Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's erstwhile procurer who is serving a 20-year federal prison sentence for child sex trafficking, and the Trump administration's subsequent transfer of Maxwell to a lower-security correctional facility. The suit also notes that Trump has refused to rule out clemency for Maxwell.
"President Trump has repeatedly said he would release the Epstein files, his spokesperson claims his administration is 'the most transparent in history,' and yet, they continue to hide from the American people," Democracy Forward president and CEO Skye Perryman said in a statement. "The only thing transparent about the Trump-Vance administration is how clearly they continue to disregard our nation's laws."
"Public records laws outline a clear and simple process that requires the government to immediately produce important documents in response to urgent public information requests, and yet again, this administration is ignoring the law," Perryman added. "The court should intervene urgently to ensure the public has access to the information they need about this extraordinary situation."
Trump's efforts to deflect and distract from the Epstein scandal have outraged even many of his hardcore supporters and resulted in calls for transparency from both sides of the political aisle. The president denies any wrongdoing related to Epstein, calling the controversy over the files a "hoax" while denouncing Republicans demanding transparency as "weaklings." Trump also sued The Wall Street Journal over reporting that he wrote a "bawdy" letter for Epstein's 50th birthday in 2003.
On Thursday, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) led 15 Democratic colleagues in a letter urging House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) to hold a hearing with victims of Epstein and Maxwell.
Congress must stand up for Epstein’s victims, not protect his rich and powerful friends.@pressley.house.gov is demanding a public Oversight hearing to give these survivors the opportunity to share their stories with the American people.
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— Oversight Dems (@oversightdemocrats.house.gov) August 7, 2025 at 2:19 PM
"If we are to hold powerful people to account, our investigation must center the voices they tried to silence," the Democratic lawmakers wrote. "To ensure that our investigation is comprehensive and credible, we urge the committee to allow survivors the opportunity to provide their testimony if they wish to do so."
Pressley—a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and rape in college—told The 19th* that if Comer refuses to hold such a hearing, "I will remind people why it didn't happen and that those elected officials are on the side of predators, while the Democrats are on the side of survivors."
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