Bomb threats disrupt two schools. Did right-wing LibsofTikTok posts help prompt them?
Another attack over LGBTQ issues is shocking, but no surprise to experts who have watched the growing extremist rhetoric against LGBTQ people over the last two years. Meanwhile, we reported exclusively this week that federal prosecutions over threats are at an all-time high, and are expected to stay that way in the tense political climate. And a far-right Twitter account that mocks people makes posts that precede disruptive bomb threats in California and Oklahoma.
It’s the week in extremism.
Public schools face bomb threats in Tulsa, Davis after posts by LibsofTikTok
At least twice this week, targets of the far-right X account LibsofTikTok received bomb threats after the account tweeted about them.
On Monday, a library in Davis, California, received a bomb threat that included “hate speech,” according to local police. The library and a nearby school were evacuated.
The library in Yolo County entered the spotlight online after public speaking event. When a group of speakers started out by calling female transgender athletes “biological males,” a librarian asked them to leave. That interaction was caught on video, and a far-right backlash from LibsofTikTok and others ensued.
On Wednesday, a school in Tulsa, Oklahoma, received two bomb threats the day after LibsofTikTok tweeted about the school’s librarian, who had posted a tongue-in-cheek video on social media saying she wasn’t finished “pushing her woke agenda” on kids. ("My radical liberal agenda,” she wrote in the post, “is teaching kids to love books and be kind.")
Some parents pulled their kids out of school in response to the threats – and more controversy ensued when state’s schools superintendent retweeted LibsofTikTok’s post with his own comment – "Woke ideology is real and I am here to stop it" – about the same time as the bomb threats.
In both incidents, authorities determined the bomb threats were not credible.
Pride flag shooting in California no surprise
Last Friday, authorities say, a 27-year-old man shot and killed Laura Ann Carleton, a mother of nine in a small mountain community east of Los Angeles, apparently after disparaging the Pride flag she displayed outside her store and shouting homophobic slurs at her. Police said the shooter posted anti-LGBTQ content on social media.
From USA TODAY: In shooting over store's Pride flag, predictions of violence again become reality
It’s just the latest such attack and, while shocking, comes as no surprise to extremism experts.
Social media accounts in the name of the shooter posted conspiracy theories spread by far-right extremists and mixed anti-abortion posts and Bible verses with posts equating "Pride Month" to the word "demon" in the weeks before the attack.
While this type of rhetoric is nothing new in America, over the last two years the LGBTQ community has become the central focus for far-right extremists and influencers.
The far-right has been largely silent about the Carleton shooting: “It's hard to imagine a really clear gain they would have by trying to do reality-denial on a situation that is just so black-and-white,” extremism expert Jared Holt told USA TODAY.
Threats against public officials, others are spiking
Recent months have seen high-profile incidents of suspects being arrested – or shot and killed – after making threats against public figures online. New data shows the number of federal prosecutions for making threats spiked last year, and is on track to hit a new high in 2023.
There were more federal prosecutions for threats in 2022 than in any of the previous 10 years, according to research from the National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education Center at the University of Nebraska, Omaha.
“We're on track to meet, if not surpass, the number of federal arrests when it comes to communicating threats against public officials this year,” said Seamus Hughes, a senior researcher on the University of Nebraska team.
Exclusive: A man was killed after threatening Biden. It's not just him: Threats are on rise across US
Experts worry the number of threats — and potentially deadly confrontations with law enforcement — is only going to increase in the tense political climate.
Statistic of the week: 22%
That’s the increase in hate crimes in the 10 largest cities in the United States last year compared with the year before, hitting a record high, according to new data released today by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino.
The center, which has tallied hate crimes across the nation since 1999, also found that the number of hate crimes reported to police in 42 major US cities rose 10% last year.
The full report will be released next week.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Tulsa bomb threat, Davis bomb threat: LibsofTikTok posts preceded both
