The CEO of the social networking website Gab has revealed posts that he claims may have been written by Donald Trump’s would-be assassin Thomas Crooks.
Andrew Torba revealed on Wednesday that an unnamed law enforcement agency informed him that Crooks may have posted pro-Biden messages on Gab, a platform known for its alt-right users and conspiratorial content.
The @epicmicrowave account, which Torba has been unable to confirm belongs to Crooks, was last active on the site in 2021.
‘As far as we are aware, the account did not use the site to send any direct messages,’ Torba said.
‘He posted on the site nine (9) times total… While the account made very few posts on the site, the majority of them were in support of President Biden.
‘A number of posts in particular expressed support for President Biden’s COVID lockdowns, border policies and executive orders.’
Torba also shared images of the posts he claimed were written by Crooks.
In a post from February 2021, the poster replies to an electoral projection with: ‘Didn’t you also think Biden would lose in a landslide yeah I would not be very confident in your election predictions.’
In another post, the Gab user defended Biden’s border policies saying they don’t incentivize human trafficking and linked to a study that compared crime by undocumented migrants with those of legal migrants and American citizens in Texas.
The poster wrote: ‘Biden executive orders don’t incentivize human trafficking as human traffickers aren’t interested in citizenships, likewise the majority of illegal immigrants are not criminals and in fact some studies (such as the one linked below) show lower rates of crime committed by these individuals.’
In one post from February 2021, the writer seemed to support COVID lockdown policies, writing: ‘The reason all the deaths are down is because you are stuck in your house.’
Torba claimed he had received ‘an emergency disclosure request from a law enforcement agency’ and was revealing the posts ‘at significant personal and business risk.’
‘If the past is any guide, defying the D.C. consensus by publishing the first definitive evidence that the shooter was a Biden supporter – something Democrats and their media allies have tried to cover up and deny at every turn – has a high probability of resulting in significant political and media backlash,’ Torba wrote.
‘In the past, we have been the target of politically motivated inquiries from both the House Oversight Committee and the Joint Committee on the January 6th Attacks, both of which sought to interfere with our mission of protecting free speech online.’
Investigators have found no threatening comments on social media accounts or ideological positions that could help explain what led him to target Trump
The Anti-Defamation League has said Gab is a ‘haven for hate and disinformation.’
According to the ADL: ‘Torba himself espouses much of the same hateful and extremist rhetoric that his platform is known for.’
The FBI is investigating the shooting by Crooks at a Trump rally as an act of domestic terrorism.
The agency has built out a detailed timeline of Crooks’ movements and online activity, but the precise motive or why Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, was singled out remains elusive, Wray said.
