Dear John,

Our hearts break yet again and we offer our sincere condolences after another mass shooting. This one left nine dead (including the shooter) at an Allen, TX outlet mall this past weekend. Preliminary research by the ADL Center on Extremism indicates that Mauricio Garcia, the suspect in the mass shooting, was obsessed with violence and subscribed to a range of extremist ideologies, including antisemitism, violent misogyny and white supremacy.

It should not come as a surprise that he may have been motivated or tied to right wing extremist movements. As ADL has consistently documented, right-wing extremist violence poses the greatest violent extremist threat to America. Of the 444 people killed at the hands of extremists over the past 10 years, 75% were killed by right-wing extremists and the majority of those by white supremacists.

An initial assessment of a massive social media trove, which ADL researchers can link to Garcia with a high degree of confidence, reveals a preoccupation with violence and hate, especially towards women and Jews. His posts demonstrate a profoundly violent misogyny; he writes “I hate women.... they are literally the most useless thing on the planet,” and uses terms specific to the incel — or involuntary celibate — community, which blames women for their own lack of sexual and romantic success.

His posts are also littered with antisemitic, white supremacist tropes and vitriol, including claims that “the Jews” have “engineered society so that men cannot mate with a woman,” and images of SS bolt and swastika tattoos on Garcia’s arms and chest. Garcia also posted anti-Asian and anti-LGBTQ+ content.

According to reports, the shooter wore an “RWDS” patch. The term “right-wing death squad” first emerged in the 1970s to describe Central and South American paramilitary units created to support right-wing governments. The phrase re-emerged among right-wing extremists in the United States in recent years, with “RWDS” being used in screen names and hashtags and appearing on the shields used at the violent 2017 “Unite the Right” white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

How to Talk with Young People About a Tragedy

After a tragic event like this senseless violence where young people lost their lives, it can be a scary and potentially painful topic to talk with the young people in your life about. Here are some topics and questions to help guide the conversation.

As we learn more about the attacker’s motives and connections, we will post them to ADL.org and to our social channels. Thank you for being part of the ADL community as we Fight Hate for Good in the wake of this horrific extremist attack.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Greenblatt

CEO and National Director

ADL