Thomas Matthew Crooks, the suspectin Saturday’s shooting, was registered as a Republican voter, according to Pennsylvania records.

Already the republicans are dismissing his voter registration as meaningless. Here comes the “mental illness” angle.

Edit: apparently it’s not uncommon to register with the party you oppose in PA. This is going to be a fun ride.

  • Cistello
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    1 month ago

    Used to vote for Republicans and then donated for Democrats

    • MagicShel@programming.dev
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      1 month ago

      He was 20. He could have voted only in a single election. Someone said he donated to democrats 3 years ago. This math is confusing the fuck out of me.

      • Asafum@feddit.nl
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        1 month ago

        Unfortunately I think what we’re going to learn is that he’s one of those people that register Republican to vote in their primaries to choose the weakest candidate giving Democrats a better chance.

        Either way I unfortunately think this is going to give Trump yet another boost… God knows that’s what we needed…

        • MagicShel@programming.dev
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          That’s possible. Because we damn sure aren’t going to learn that people are more complicated than a simple black & white label.

          If this comes across as argumentative, I don’t mean it that way. It’s just pure cynicism.

        • Gerudo@lemm.ee
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          1 month ago

          I read a snippit that in PA, it’s not uncommon to register for the other party. More than likely, he really was a dem/non repub.

        • DarkCloud@lemmy.world
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          With just the same first and last name, where as the Republican party registration had other corroborating data, such as middle initial, address, and date of birth.

          So the donation is nowhere near as solid as the Republican party registration.

        • MagicShel@programming.dev
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          17 year olds, supposedly. (I can’t verify the three years ago, so grain of salt.)

          This doesn’t really make sense and we might just have to wait for actual details from the investigation.

          • dragontamer@lemmy.world
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            1 month ago

            Some people are saying $10, which is a lot more to a kid than to an adult. But kids can afford $10.

            EDIT: $15 to more reliable sources. Still in the rough ballpark tho

          • jeffw@lemmy.world
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            NYTimes, so there’s a paywall. It links to the FEC (wouldn’t load on mobile for me but the FEC page did fully load on my desktop).

            https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/14/us/politics/trump-gunman-thomas-crooks.html

            Edit: actually, the article has been updated since I read it. It no longer links to the FEC, just a NYT screenshot:

            https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/fe91e6ba36695009/ac182c3a-full.pdf

            Though it says Pitt, the zip is a Bethel Park zip

            voter-registration record showed Mr. Crooks’s Republican registration, though federal campaign-finance records show he donated $15 to the Progressive Turnout Project, a liberal voter turnout group, through the Democratic donation platform ActBlue in January 2021.

            • DarkCloud@lemmy.world
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              Where as the Republican party registration has other corroborating information listed, the donation doesn’t have anything other than the same first and last name. So it’s not confirmed to be the same guy yet.

              • jeffw@lemmy.world
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                Name, job, and zip code. Find me another guy living in Bethel Park with the same name who was unemployed in 2021 (edit: Bethel Park has 4 zip codes, so not even all of Bethel Park. People really think there’s another guy with such a unique name in town? None of his relatives share the same name, so an unrelated guy?)

                • DarkCloud@lemmy.world
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                  I think you’re misreading me.

                  I’m saying the Republican party registration has those things, but the donation doesn’t, so could be from someone with the same first and last name from anywhere.

                  So the Republican party registration is this more corroborated by having the extra information. Whereas the donation isn’t, due to not having that extra information with it.

                  • jeffw@lemmy.world
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                    The donation does have those things. I think you’re misreading me (or the FEC filing).

                    The FEC filing shows name and zip code, as well as the job. It matches the voter registration. If you think there are 2 Thomas Crooks in the same 5 sq mi radius that were both unemployed at the same time, that’s pretty wild. By all means, use WhitePages to find a second Thomas Crooks who lived in 15102 in 2021 who could’ve given that donation.

              • jeffw@lemmy.world
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                1 month ago

                He lives there too. Without doxing anyone or putting their info on here, you can read in the news that they all live together (dad, mom, son. Sister moved out a couple years ago)

                • kromem@lemmy.world
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                  1 month ago

                  Yes, I know.

                  So in the house you had the mother, the father Matthew, and the son Thomas.

                  Then the ActBlue donation is to a Thomas Crooks with the street address registered to Matthew Crooks.

                  So the idea that the donation was from some other Thomas Crooks seems unlikely, no?

                  Unless there’s some unmentioned Thomas Crooks that was living in the house Jan 2021.

        • mosiacmango@lemm.ee
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          Lots of noise right now. Dont have a source past a random comment, so doubt is warranted.